


that which we are, we are (made weak by time and fate)

by ScribeofArda



Series: I am a part of all that I have met [2]
Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: ALL THE TROPES AGAIN, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Domestic Fluff, First Time, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, Illya doesn't help himself, It's not easy recovering from an assassination attempt, M/M, Mutual Pining, Napoleon worries, Recovery, So many tropes, seriously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-19
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2018-12-17 11:14:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 48,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11850429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScribeofArda/pseuds/ScribeofArda
Summary: Napoleon keeps talking, and Illya knows he should be looking at the painting, but he can’t tear his eyes away from him. Napoleon’s face has lit up, his eyes bright, and Illya can’t help but remember that day in Vienna, where he had looked at Napoleon and thought: Oh. I suppose this is it, then.Illya can remember dying in the street, ash and blood and Napoleon's name on his lips. But he doesn't die. Instead, he wakes up with Napoleon sitting next to his bed, holding his hand. It hasn't ended yet in the way they are both so afraid of, but that doesn't mean that living is easy. They are spies, and the game is never kind to them.Illya blinks, and focuses on Napoleon. He doesn’t listen to what he is saying. He’s trying to memorise the lines of Napoleon’s face.There are a thousand unspoken words between them, begging to be heard before they become just another regret on top of the many they've already accumulated over the years, but the game never stops, not even for love.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, here is the sequel! It starts out with a load of domestic fluff and the boys dancing around their feelings like the emotionally constipated spies that they are, but it will reach some actual plot and angst at some point. There's nearly 49k of this story, there is plot buried somewhere beneath all the tropes.
> 
> Again, chapters will be fairly regular, as they were for the first story. You could get away with not reading the first story if you're reading this, but it's probably a good idea to read the first one, well, first.

“I will shoot you before you walk out of here.”

Illya’s lips curl in a grin. “I’d like to see you try,” he says. His ribs ache when he moves, pulling himself upright without trying to look like he’s readying himself to dive a weapon, but he ignores it and focuses on his opponent. “Go on,” he adds, goading the man who has planted himself in the doorway. “I dare you.”

The dramatics of the moment are ruined when Gaby breezes past Napoleon standing in the doorway and fixes the both of them with a look. “Boys,” she chides. “Stop being so dramatic. Not everything has to be a spy movie.”

Napoleon grins, and lounges against the doorway. “But then it wouldn’t be as fun,” he points out, and Illya throws a pillow at him. Napoleon just manages to catch it before it hits his face, and glares at Illya.

Gaby heaves a sigh as they start quarrelling. “Boys,” she says again, cutting through their bickering. “You know I can’t understand Russian when you speak that fast.”

Illya blinks, trailing off halfway through a sentence. He hadn’t even realised he’d switched into Russian, he’d just started speaking and Napoleon had answered. He supposes that Napoleon was speaking in Russian when he first woke up, and neither of them really stopped. Judging by the look on Napoleon’s face, he hadn’t really realised either.

“Now,” Gaby says, folding her arms. “Illya. Get in the damn wheelchair.”

Napoleon feels a grin curl his lips as Illya actually _pouts_. “Nyet,” he protests. “I’m not leaving in that…thing.”

“You’re not leaving here any other way than in that wheelchair,” Napoleon says. “By all means, try and get up and walk out. I won’t catch you when you fall over.” Gaby shoves an elbow into his side, and Napoleon rolls his eyes. “Fine, I’ll catch you, but I’ll be really petty about it afterwards.” Illya gives him a look, and Napoleon just grins.

“You have a piece of metal holding the bones together in your leg,” Gaby says, completely not amused by Napoleon’s antics. “And you have multiple broken ribs. Goddammit, Illya, only a week ago you had a tube down your throat helping you breathe!” She breaks off, visibly pulling back control of herself, and Illya’s glare softens slightly.

“If you don’t get in the wheelchair, then the doctor won’t let you leave,” she says, in a quieter voice. “And I think you want to get out of here as soon as possible.”

Illya glances around the room that he’s been staring at for the past week, ever since waking up in an unfamiliar hospital bed, Napoleon at his side. At the thought he glances at Napoleon, his constant presence unsettling in just how reassuring it was, to wake up disoriented and in pain and hear Napoleon’s voice, the slight accent to his Russian that he still can’t get rid of.

“Give us a moment, Gaby,” Napoleon says, and Gaby huffs, but steps outside. Napoleon waits until the door closes before he pulls over a chair, and sits down opposite Illya.

“She’s worried about you,” he says, looking serious for a moment. “She thinks you’re not going to take this recovery seriously, and do some permanent damage.”

Illya scoffs. “As if I would risk it,” he mutters. “Getting back to being cleared for the field is going to take enough work as it is. I know my own limits.”

“I know that,” Napoleon says patiently. “But Gaby doesn’t.” He holds Illya’s gaze until Illya shrugs, and shakes his head. “Now, I can help you get into the wheelchair whilst there’s nobody else in the room, or I can get the doctor and all the nurses to come in and help. Your choice.”

Illya glares at him, and Napoleon huffs a sigh. “Look,” he says. “I know you think it’s humiliating and embarrassing to have to use the wheelchair, but dammit Peril, if anyone is allowed a little slack it’s you. You did nearly die, after all, and you absolutely cannot walk on that leg or use crutches with your ribs. It’s the wheelchair or the hospital.”

Illya is still glaring, but Napoleon notices it lessening slightly, and knows he’s winning. “If you get in the wheelchair, I’ll give you a gun,” he offers. “And I’ll go down to that patisserie when we get home and buy you a box of those éclairs I know you like.”

“The ones with the French cream?” Illya asks, and just like that, Napoleon knows he’s won.

He nods. “I’ll even spring for a mille-feuille, if you stop arguing with me and get in the fucking wheelchair,” he adds, standing up and pulling the wheelchair closer. “Come on, Peril. Let’s go home.”

Illya sighs, and lets Napoleon pull his arm over his shoulders and take some of his weight as he stands up. Even that movement makes his ribs protest and his leg ache sharply, and Napoleon pauses as he catches his breath. “Don’t say it, Cowboy” Illya grunts as he hobbles the few steps over to the wheelchair, barely able to put weight on his leg. He can tell that Napoleon has a smug look on his face without even looking at him.

Napoleon shakes his head, and lowers Illya into the wheelchair. “I wasn’t going to,” he says with a smirk. “Even though it is so tempting.” He pulls his pistol out of his shoulder holster and hands it over. “Keep that hidden. I don’t think the doctor will be too happy with me giving you a weapon in here.”

Illya scoffs. “I could make a weapon out of anything in this room, Cowboy,” he says, but he tucks the pistol away and out of sight. Napoleon grins, and lets Illya kick open the door with his good leg as they leave.

They head in an UNCLE car back to their apartments, Gaby driving. Andrysiak accompanies them with case files for Napoleon and medicine for Illya, and Illya has a slight suspicion as to why Napoleon doesn’t just take both from him, and lets him sit in the front of the car.

He leans his head against the car window, wincing at the pull on the stitches across his torso, and watches the lights of New York. It’s raining slightly, the type of dreary drizzle that has people wondering if an umbrella is too much, and the lights of the street lamps blur and run into each other as rain trickles down the window.

Illya shifts slightly and looks over at Napoleon, who is staring out of his own window. In the light of the street lamps he looks illuminated, sharp angles against the soft yellow warmth of the light, so sharply in focus whilst the rest of the city runs past. Illya wonders how something so beautiful can be allowed to exist.

A moment later, he almost laughs at himself. It seems the pain medication is kicking in.

Gaby pulls into the underground parking lot of the UNCLE apartment building and ignores all the parking spaces, pulling up in front of one of the elevators. “Please tell me someone put the wheelchair in the trunk,” she says. “Because it’s a long corridor from the lift to Illya’s apartment.”

“Hang on a moment,” Napoleon says. “Andrysiak, a word. Peril, stay in the car.” He gets out and shuts the door behind him. Andrysiak steps out, looking mildly confused.

“What is it?” he asks.

Napoleon leans against the hood of the car, and sticks his hands in his pockets. “I need a favour,” he says softly. Andrysiak just waits expectantly, and Napoleon’s lips curl in a slight smile. “I need you to go up to my apartment and make it look like Peril and I have gone in,” he says. “Turn on lights, whatever you want. And I need you to not ask where we’re going.”

At that, Andrysiak arches a brow. “Are you at least staying in New York?” he asks. “Or should I tell Waverly you’ve quit?”

Napoleon huffs a laugh. “The CIA know where my apartment is,” he simply says. “They don’t know where my…other properties are, I’ve made sure of it. For now, until I can be sure Peril can either protect himself or doesn’t have a damn target on his back, I’m taking some precautions.” He glances back at the car. “Gaby will know where we are, and I bet Waverly does as well.”

Andrysiak nods. “Not the most paranoid thing I’ve seen an agent ever do,” he comments. “And it’s probably quite smart. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you aren’t followed when you leave, and any CIA agents watching won’t know to follow you in the first place.”

Napoleon smiles, and it’s genuine. Over the days he’s spent in Medical, Andrysiak has been surprisingly helpful. “I owe you a favour. Anything that’s not too illegal, at any time. Call it in and I’ll be there.”

Andrysiak smirks. “A favour from Napoleon Solo? From what I’ve heard, those are to be treasured.”

Napoleon shrugs. “You deserve one,” he just says. He holds out his hand. “Thank you for all your help. I’ll be back in the office soon.”

Andrysiak laughs. “Take your time,” he says, shaking Napoleon’s hand. “If you don’t get a personal phone call from Waverly or his secretary telling you to get the hell back to work, then you’re not pushing it far enough.” He nods at Illya and Gaby in the car, and then heads for the elevator.

Napoleon gets back into the car, still getting in the back. “Wait twenty minutes, and then leave,” he tells Gaby.

Gaby twists around in her seat. “Would you like to explain what’s going on?” she asks. “Also, keep your voice down. I think Illya is falling asleep.”

Napoleon glances over at him and sure enough, Illya has fallen asleep against the side of the car, breath fogging the glass. “He’s going to hurt when he wakes up,” he murmurs.

“Let him sleep,” Gaby says. “We’ll wake him before we drive off. Now, where are we going?”

“My penthouse,” Napoleon replies, with a quick grin as Gaby stares at him. “The CIA don’t know where it is, so it’s a lot safer whilst Peril is so incapacitated. Besides, I like it more than my apartment here. The bed is comfier, and the view is much better.”

Gaby sighs, looking like she’s fed up of Napoleon’s antics, as she likes to call them. “Fine,” she says. She reaches over and pulls a magazine out of her handbag, and stretches out over the front seats. “Let me know when you want to leave.”

Napoleon spends the twenty minutes that they sit in the car flipping through the case files that Andrysiak left for him, though he doesn’t take any of it in. Every few minutes he glances up to watch Illya sleep with a slight furrow in his brow, probably from the pressure he’s putting on his ribs with the way he’s leaning against the window. He has soft stubble from the past few days in the hospital, when he was awake and alert enough to glare at any nurse who offered to help him shave.

Napoleon shuts the files, eventually, and slides them back into his briefcase. “Let’s go,” he says, leaning across the seats and gently grasping Illya’s shoulder. “Peril,” he says softly. “Wake up.”

Illya blinks and then winces as he tries to sit up. Napoleon pulls him away from the car door until he’s sitting up straight. “We’re not going up?” he asks, his voice rasping. Gaby starts up the car and drives out of the parking lot back onto the street.

“Upper East Side, 5th Avenue and East 82nd Street,” Napoleon says to her, and then turns to Illya. “These apartments aren’t safe,” he explains. “The CIA know where they are, and I don’t trust them enough to think they won’t be watching. Andrysiak will make sure we’re not followed, and we’re going to my penthouse. You’re staying there with me until you’re less incapacitated.”

Illya rolls his eyes. “And I suppose I don’t get a say in this?” he asks.

“Of course not,” Napoleon replies cheerfully. “You’re going to love it.”

“I’m going to murder you,” Illya mutters.

Napoleon grins. “That’s the spirit, Peril.”

0-o-0-o-0

Gaby whistles appreciatively when Napoleon disables the various security measures around his apartment and finally lets them in. “I’m not surprised you kept this a secret,” she says, wandering over to the windows that stretched from floor to ceiling, looking out over Central Park, the green slowly fading to a thousand shades of orange.

Illya huffs as Napoleon pushes him through the door, already hating the wheelchair with a passion. “Which bank account paid for this one again, Cowboy?” he asks, glancing around the large open living room and kitchen of the penthouse. “The one in Switzerland?”

“Cayman Islands,” Napoleon says over his shoulder as he cases out the rest of the apartment, checking everything is as it should be. Illya does the same, as best as he can whilst trying to work out how to get around in the wheelchair. The habits of a spy are too well ingrained, even somewhere like this that he knows is safe.

Illya hums, and manages to manoeuvre himself to near the fireplace. “You replaced the Monet,” he says to Napoleon, who reappears with a nod that the place is secure, and resets the security measures. “Where did you put it?”

“Oh, it’s in my collection. I thought that Seurat deserved to have the limelight for a moment,” Napoleon says, wandering over to admire the painting above the fireplace. “Monet is admirable, but sometimes I just prefer Seurat’s colour palette.” He stands there, hands in his pockets as he studies the painting, and Illya studies him out of the corner of his eye. Napoleon is almost always his most unguarded when he’s around art.

Gaby coughs, and they both turn to see her standing by the windows. “I’m sure it’s a priceless painting that you didn’t acquire legally,” she says dryly. “But perhaps we could get things settled? How secure is this place anyway?” She gestures at the windows behind her. “Seems like a perfect target for a sniper.”

“Windows are bulletproof,” Illya mutters as Napoleon wheels him towards the bedroom. “And reflective on the outside. Nobody can see in. Unless Cowboy has been tampering with my designs again, security is impossible to break.”

“I’m not tampering, I’m _improving_ ,” Napoleon protests, and he somehow manages to sound petulant as he says it.

Gaby arches a brow. “Somehow, I think I shouldn’t be surprised that you know about this place,” she says. She follows them into the main bedroom, where Napoleon parks the wheelchair. Gaby recognises one of Illya’s bags already sitting on the bed, and realises Napoleon had been planning to come here ever since he’d first known Illya was going to pull through.

“Peril is very good at designing security traps,” Napoleon says wryly. They’d spent nearly a week, over the course of a month or two, making this place impenetrable by taking turns to try and break in with their own tactics and then fixing the holes. “And I’m even better at finding holes in them.” At that, Illya snorts in amusement.

“Right,” Napoleon says, unpacking a little of Illya’s bag. “You’re getting into bed, and don’t even try to argue with me because I can see how much your ribs are hurting, and you need to put your leg up. I will make something to eat, and wake you up for it. Do you need more painkillers?”

Illya rolls his eyes. “No, mother,” he mutters. Napoleon offers a hand and Illya purposefully ignores it, grabbing one of the posters of the bed to pull himself up. “I can get dressed myself,” he says to Napoleon and Gaby with a meaningful glare, even as he suppresses a wince from the simple movement of just getting up. “Get out.”

Gaby holds up her hands. “I’m raiding your drinks cabinet,” she tells Napoleon, and heads out of the bedroom.

Napoleon lingers for a moment more. “You’re not going to be able to raise your arms over your head to get that shirt off,” he says as Illya continues to glare at him. “At least let me-” He trails off as Illya grips the collar of his shirt and pulls along a seam, all but ripping the shirt off. Napoleon arches a brow, trying to ignore the expanse of skin Illya has just revealed. “Well, that solves that,” he says. “Shout if you’re going to break another bone.”

In the living room Gaby is poring through the drinks cabinet. Napoleon isn’t often in his penthouse, preferring to keep it as somewhere he can retreat to when he needs to step away from the game, but spirits don’t often spoil and he stocked the place this week anyway. “Grab me the scotch, will you?” he asks her. “The Oban bottle, not the Glenfiddich.”

Gaby grabs it, and grabs herself a bottle of vodka. “Not that one,” Napoleon says as he sees her choice. “There’s a different bottle. That one’s for a special occasion.”

Gaby studies it, and then arches a brow. “This is Illya’s favourite,” she says, but Napoleon has disappeared into the kitchen already. She follows him to find him pulling ingredients from the cupboard, apparently intent on cooking for then all. “You really are quite far gone, aren’t you?” she asks, leaning against the exceedingly decadent marble counters.

Napoleon shrugs. “No use crying over spilt milk,” he just says as he starts chopping vegetables, and Gaby stares at him.

“What the hell does that mean?” she asks.

Napoleon glances at her, suddenly amused. “I forget you’re German, occasionally,” he says. “It’s an American phrase. It means don’t get upset over something that’s already happened.” He shrugs again. “I’ve known for months that I love him, now. There’s not much I can do about it.”

Gaby sighs. “Boys,” she mutters, and drinks half her glass of vodka in one go. “You could talk? That’s always an option.”

Napoleon looks slightly amused. “Yes, and get punched in the face by Peril? I’d rather pass. He’s never shown any interest in men. It’s probably not the Russian way.” Besides, with Illya badly hurt and probably quite high on painkillers, doing anything now would be the wrong idea. Napoleon doesn’t even know if Illya remembers anything he said that night on the street, but he doubts it.

“For what it’s worth,” Gaby says. “I think you’re wrong.” She downs the rest of her drink, and pours herself another. “But I’ll leave you to your silent pining and moping.”

“Hey,” Napoleon says, pointing the kitchen knife at her. “Napoleon Solo does not mope.”

“Darling, you mope better than a starving French artist,” Gaby says. “Also, when you refer to yourself in the third person it’s a clear giveaway that you’re lying.” Napoleon huffs, but turns back to cooking. Gaby hides her smile behind her glass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A mille-feuille, for those who don't know, is a French pastry dessert thing where there are layers of thin, crispy pastry, cream and often fresh fruit, and it is heaven. It literally translates to 'a thousand leaves'.
> 
> The address Napoleon gives for his apartment is actually pretty much opposite the Met, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, which itself is on the edge of Central Park. All of this I looked up with google maps- I've been to New York once, but most of what I know about it comes from the TV.
> 
> Oban and Glenfiddich are both types of Scotch, named after the places that they are made. I've had Oban scotch when my parents were there on holiday and brought some back, but I was way more interested in the artisan chocolates they brought back as well- seriously, look up Oban chocolates, they're amazing. Apparently they even had a chocolate cafe, which sounds like heaven.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there is more domestic fluff with the boys and random political discussions. Oh, and Napoleon pines a lot. Because of course he does.  
> Thanks to all the amazing responses to this so far! I hope I don't disappoint as I continue.

It’s late by the time Gaby leaves, heading back to her own apartment. Napoleon pours himself another scotch from the Oban bottle and leans against the doorway to the bedroom, watching Illya sleep.

Illya looks younger when he’s asleep, and though he can never fully lose the dangerous air about him, Napoleon thinks someone could, at a distance, mistake him for something other than a wolf, teeth bared, ready to take on the world. Napoleon knows some of the barest details of the training the KGB uses, either from Illya himself or his various contacts around the world, and even that is enough for him to see where they carved into Illya and left blood and rage in his bones. Now, though, Illya just looks tired, and not deadly.

In their world, that is a rare luxury. Napoleon feels privileged to be able to witness it.

Illya’s watch is on his wrist, and he hasn’t taken it off since Napoleon gave it back to him the day after he woke up and they knew he was going to pull through. Illya had stared at him for a long moment and then taken the watch with trembling hands. Napoleon had put it on his wrist for him, thanks to the drugs Illya had been on making him completely miss where his own wrist was and drop the watch twice.

He sighs softly and turns away, letting the door close but not fall shut. He’s been on the medication Illya is on before, and he vividly remembers the dreams. Knowing Illya and the KGB, there’s enough nightmare fodder in his head for an entire army. He’s seen a little of it before; when living out of each other’s pockets for over a year, it’s inevitable that they see the worse sides of each other at times. Illya has had to wake Napoleon up from nightmares about the chair and Rudi a few times, and once got a black eye for his troubles. Surprisingly, Illya just shrugged it off and sat down on the other side of the bed. They stayed like that for hours: not talking much, just in each other’s company. In the morning they went their separate ways, back on the mission, and didn’t speak of it.

They don’t speak of a lot of things, Napoleon muses. When he was captured and interrogated by the villain of the week, they never spoke of how Illya’s hands trembled when he finally found him and untied him from the chair. They’ve never spoken of the late nights they spent huddled together in safehouses in Canada, or melting even at two in the morning in Sao Paulo, rationing out parts of their lives and secrets like they were rounds for a rifle, magazines steadily loaded as they spoke, barrels pointed at each other but the triggers never pulled.

They probably won’t speak of what happened either, not really. Illya probably doesn’t remember what he said, and Napoleon won’t use it as leverage against him in any way. It will become just one more thing that is a consequence of the game they play, that he’ll bury down until he has more than half a bottle of scotch in him.

Napoleon knows he would rather keep what they have now than risk looking for more, and losing it all in the process.

A CIA thief and a KGB agent, Napoleon thinks with a huff of laughter. He never would have thought there would be a day where he knew some of the secrets that could bring a KGB agent to his knees, and instead of using them would guard them jealously, keep them close and make sure nobody else could use them to destroy someone he’s supposed to hate. He shakes his head, and wanders into the spare room to make up the bed.

0-o-0-o-0

Illya wakes slowly, forcing his eyes open and spending a few moments staring at the ceiling, wondering where exactly he is. There’s no urgency thrumming through him, telling him to get up and move, so he must be somewhere safe. He just can’t quite remember where that is.

He tries to sit up and his breath stutters at the pain in his ribs. The door creaks open and Napoleon looks in, looking like he’s only just woken up. His hair is tousled, and there’s a shadow of stubble across his jaw. Still fighting off sleep, Illya thinks it’s no wonder Napoleon was drawn to art, when he looks like someone sculpted him from marble.

“Think you can manage pancakes, Peril?” Napoleon asks. “Or more painkillers first?”

Illya sits up with a grunt, trying not to instinctively clutch at his ribs. “Painkillers,” he gets out, swinging his legs over the bed and experiencing a peculiar feeling when his casted leg unbalances him and nearly sends him sprawling. Napoleon darts forwards and catches him, pulling him upright.

He laughs. “You’re a bit unbalanced there,” he says with a grin. “I’ll grab the painkillers you can have without food, and then make pancakes.”

“Pancakes, Cowboy?” Illya asks as he hauls himself to his feet with a wince and hobbles to the bathroom, trying to put as little weight on his broken leg as possible.

“The true pinnacle of capitalist decadence,” Napoleon says as he takes some of Illya’s weight and helps him into the bathroom. Illya glares at him, but Napoleon ignores it. “Thick fluffy pancakes, covered in maple syrup, with crispy bacon on the side. Just think of it, Peril. Completely unnecessary but still so good.”

Illya rolls his eyes, and swallows the two pills that Napoleon got out from a bottle on the sink. “We have pancakes in Russia too, Cowboy,” he says.

“Really?” Napoleon asks. “I thought you just ate potatoes and read sad fatalistic novels that are too long for anyone sensible to pick them up.”

Illya rolls his eyes again. “And drink,” he says. “Don’t forget the vodka. Now get out, Cowboy. Go make pancakes.”

Napoleon grins. “Shout if you break something,” he says as he shuts the door behind him. “Don’t try shaving, you’ll only cut your own throat.”

“Yes, we wouldn’t want to deprive the CIA of their chance,” Illya calls out dryly. “Pancakes, Cowboy.”

By the time Illya has hobbled out of the bathroom and collapses at the kitchen table, Napoleon has a stack of pancakes ready and waiting. “You have to have maple syrup on these,” he says as Illya pulls the stack towards him and grabs a fork. “No skimping on it, either. There’s bacon frying in the pan.” He keeps up some inane chatter about candied bacon and a mission in Canada as Illya eats, keeping a careful eye on his partner as he does so.

He can judge Illya’s mood well enough from how much he manages to eat in one sitting. When Illya is in a good mood he can eat Napoleon out of house and home, as he has done various times by now. The worse his mood gets, the less he eats. After one disastrous mission in Beijing, Illya flat out refused to eat anything Napoleon made or bought, and Napoleon had taken the vodka from him and poured it down the sink, along with the baijiu that had been calling out to him all night.

Now, Illya eats about a third of the stack of pancakes before he grimaces and pushes the plate away. Napoleon arches a brow. “Too much maple syrup?” he asks.

Illya shakes his head. “Just feeling sick,” he mutters. Napoleon looks concerned, and he huffs a brief laugh. “I won’t throw up over your rug,” he says. “Or ruin your apartment. Stop looking so worried.”

“I’m more worried about what throwing up will do to your ribs,” Napoleon points out. “But you are on opioids at the moment. The doctor said they can make you feel sick.” He flips some of the bacon in the pan. “Maybe pancakes were too much.”

Illya finds himself hating the guilty look on Napoleon’s face, over pancakes of all things. “Pancakes were good,” he says without really meaning to. “Thank you, Cowboy.”

Napoleon smiles, and it’s genuine. “You should probably go back to bed,” he says. “I’ll leave some painkillers on the bedside table, take them when you wake up. I’m going to go out and go shopping, get something to make a meal that might not make you feel sick. I’ll take my communicator with me, just in case, okay?”

“Stop worrying,” Illya says dryly. “I’m not going to fall apart.” He gets to his feet with a groan and Napoleon steadies him with an arm around his waist. The painkillers are making him drowsy and his head fuzzy, and he is secretly glad for Napoleon’s steadying presence as he limps back into the bedroom. He’s tiring quickly, and barely aware of Napoleon helping him get back in bed, propping him up on pillows and pulling a blanket up over him.

Just as he’s drifting off, he thinks he feels a hand smoothing his hair back from his forehead. Without meaning to he leans into the touch, and there’s an amused chuckle. “Sleep well, Peril,” Napoleon murmurs, and Illya can’t do anything but fall into the awaiting darkness. After all these years, he knows it well.

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon wanders around New York for a little while, crossing through into Central Park. The leaves are just beginning to fall, and Napoleon finds himself wishing he’d brought a sketchbook, so he could try and draw the leaves beginning to carpet the grass. He avoids the Met, but only just. He knows he probably shouldn’t have bought the penthouse that’s pretty much opposite the art museum, but then he can never resist temptation when it comes to art.

He spends another half hour ensuring he’s not being followed by anyone, and then ducks into a delicatessen a few blocks from his apartment. The owner, an old Jewish woman, clucks disapprovingly when he enters. “You’ve been gone far too long,” she says. Napoleon smiles wryly.

“Good morning to you too, Malka,” he says. “Hazards of my job, I’m afraid. But I’m back for a few weeks at least.”

“Go on then,” Malka says. “What extravagant recipe are you going to try and charm out of me this time?” She’s already pulling a few things out from behind the counter for him, and eyes him warily when Napoleon puts on a charming smile.

“Actually,” he says, leaning on the counter until she shoos him off. “I have a friend staying with me at the moment, and he…well, he was hit by a car last week.” Malka makes concerned noises, and Napoleon’s smile lessens into something more natural, tinged with worry. “He’ll be fine, thankfully, but he’s pretty battered and bruised, and staying with me until he’s back on his feet. The painkillers he’s on make him feel sick, so I need something easy for him to keep down.”

“Chicken soup with matzoh balls,” Malka says immediately. “Nice and simple and easy on the stomach, but good enough to get him better.” She comes out from behind the counter and Napoleon endures a ten minute lecture on the best matzo meal to use, and the exact way of making the perfect chicken stock. He leaves with armfuls of ingredients, and a promise to bring Illya round for a bite to eat once he’s feeling better.

Illya is still asleep by the time Napoleon gets back, and he puts the stock ingredients on to simmer before lounging on the couch and reading through some of the case files Andrysiak had given him. He spends two hours or so on them before he gets bored, and fiddles with a puzzle box that he hasn’t solved yet until he hears Illya shifting around. When he looks in the bedroom, Illya’s face is lined with pain. Napoleon sighs softly.

“Peril,” he says gently, shaking Illya awake. Illya blinks up at him blearily, and Napoleon rattles the bottle of pills in front of him. “Take some now, and you’ll stay on top of the pain,” he says, tapping two out into his hand. Illya stares at them for a moment, and then swallows them dry.

“What time is it?” he mutters as he sits up, wincing. Napoleon offers a helping hand, which is ignored until Illya tries to get to his feet and his knees buckle. Napoleon ducks under his arm and takes his weight, wincing himself as Illya accidentally drives his elbow into Napoleon’s side.

“A little past noon, I think,” Napoleon says as he helps Illya hobble to the couch. Illya looks annoyed, and Napoleon rolls his eyes. “You’re going to sleep a lot over the next few days, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. Sit down before you fall over and I have to take you back to Medical.”

Illya grunts, but lets Napoleon set him up on the couch, his leg propped up under cushions. He picks up one of the files Napoleon left out. “New case?” he asks, flicking through.

“Gaby wanted me to look at it,” Napoleon says as he heads into the kitchen and starts dealing with the stock. “Funds being funnelled to gangs in Rio de Janeiro. Thoughts?”

Illya spends a few minutes skimming the dossier. “They trace money?” he asks. His accent is thickening, and Napoleon remembers the times he’s been on opioids, and how blurry the world was even being able to speak in his own language. He switches into Russian.

“I have an old friend at a Swiss bank,” he says in Russian, and Illya blinks, frowning at Napoleon, but eventually says nothing. Napoleon continues. “I called in a favour with her and she got the details of the bank accounts for me. The paper is in there somewhere, I believe.”

Illya flips through and finds it. “American source,” he says with a scoff. “Why am I not surprised? Capitalism breeds corruption.”

“And communism doesn’t?” Napoleon asks. “You’re living proof that it does, Peril.” After a year and a fair few missteps, Napoleon knows how far to push Illya on his parents, what will get him a conversation and what will get him a black eye. As if to prove his theories, Illya just grunts in agreement, and turns the page in the file.

“Communism is not perfect,” he says eventually. “But there is…less invective for corruption, I suppose. In Soviet Russia, the punishments for corruption are harsh. You know this. In America, corruption is rewarded as innovation.”

“Only if you don’t get caught,” Napoleon points out, pointing his wooden spoon at Illya. “There have been plenty of senators and businessmen and corporations who have been found to be corrupt and were taken down for it. I’ve done a bit of it, whilst with the CIA.”

“Yes, but your country encourages it,” Illya says. “In America there is more…personal gain, I suppose, in making money, especially for a big company. That makes more competition, and if there’s more competition there’s always going to be some people who will try to win by breaking the law. You’re living proof of that.”

“Hey!” Napoleon protests. “I broke the law because I love art. The Nazis didn’t deserve to have any of those paintings.”

“And because it made you a lot of money,” Illya says dryly, gesturing at the penthouse around them.

“Okay, so maybe you have a point,” Napoleon concedes. “But whatever its flaws, you can’t deny what America stands for. Admittedly it’s gotten a little muddled over the years, but this was a country built on the defining truth that people are free. This is a country of immigrants and refugees, people who can be what they want.”

“And slaves,” Illya points out. “Don’t forget slavery. And the systematic murder of indigenous peoples.”

“Okay, they went wrong there,” Napoleon admits. “And the repercussions of that are still felt today, yes. But what this country stands for is still that defining truth. Some people just distort that to suit themselves. That’s going to happen in every country.”

Illya shrugs, and Napoleon levels him with a look. “Soviet Russia isn’t perfect either,” he says. “Stalin’s five year plans? Look at how many people starved during that first one. And how many people are arrested because they’re just talking about the wrong thing, or associate with the wrong people?”

Illya holds up his hands. “I never said it was perfect, Cowboy,” he says dryly. “Far from it. We’ve gone wrong over the years, yes, but our ideals? Common ownership, no class struggle, everyone working within their means and accommodated for? You cannot deny that is a good idea.”

“Idea, and idea only,” Napoleon points out. “If it worked then fine, but it doesn’t work, does it? There is always going to be people who want power, and will kill everyone in their way to get it. We spend most of our time trying to stop them now.”

Illya nods. “But capitalism doesn’t really work either,” he says, and Napoleon sighs. Most of their discussions end in some type of stalemate, especially when it comes to international politics. Sometimes, one of them will get tired and concede, late at night with drinks between them, but often it ends in an abandoned discussion before either of them starts to think they have to win, and it gets personal.

After the last fight they had, both of them have silently agreed to try and make sure it doesn’t get personal. It only ends in trashed hotel rooms, black eyes and regrets never really spoken.

Illya flips through the rest of the file. “They should get in with one of the kids in the gang,” he says. “If there’s an agent who can look out for a kid, then the kid will be indebted and might help our agent.”

Napoleon hums in agreement. “I thought of that,” he says. “But I don’t think we have any local agents, and they won’t trust an outsider.”

Illya huffs. “Ask CIA,” he says. “They just helped to overthrow Goulart and install military regime. They’ll have people on inside, and a gang kid won’t say no to a military man looking out for him. Chances are the money is related to Goulart in some way. Dissidents looking to oppose the regime, maybe, or oppose Goulart himself. Either way, it’s political.”

Napoleon wanders over and glances at the file over Illya’s shoulder. “Maybe,” he says. “But the way that they tried to hide the money is American, so the CIA might be in on it. Using the IPES or the military might be easier, but an in with the gang would be good. I’ll let Gaby know.”

Napoleon finds suddenly, as he waits for Illya to offer some suggestion about the plan as usual, that he had missed this. He had missed Illya sitting on his couch, picking apart his plans and offering suggestions that nobody in their sane mind would consider but that work anyway when put in place. He doesn’t quite know why, and he had never thought that that this was something he would have missed, but the past few weeks have put a lot into perspective for him.

There’s a slight curl to his lips, a smile he can’t keep off his face as he reads the file over Illya’s shoulder and tries to ignore the solid warmth of Illya’s body so close to him, but there’s an edge to it. He doesn’t want to acknowledge it, because if he does he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to look past the grief that had built up watching Illya die in the street, grief that now has nowhere to go to.

Illya glances up at him, saying something, and Napoleon pulls himself back to answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Crepes are valid pancakes, but nowhere near as good as proper thick buttermilk pancakes with tons of maple syrup. My mum used to travel to Canada every year, and she'd bring back about two litres of maple syrup each time, and candied bacon is a godsend.
> 
> Illya and Napoleon's discussion about corruption, etc, is partially based on my own family- my dad and sister are, shall we say, very politically aware, and if they don't both make an effort to keep things civil, dinner just turns into a shouting match between them. Ironically, they both have pretty similar political views, they just have to shout it louder than the other.
> 
> Goulart was the president of Brazil up until a military coup, backed by the US government (it's way more complicated than that, but that's not for here) threw him out of office. It's pretty amazing how deep you can get into Wikipedia when you have the time and no inclination to get off the sofa. Pity I still can't do that, I'm working ten hour days at the moment and am so tired...


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warnings for nightmare-related angst, it's nothing too graphic or drastic, but it's there. Also followed by a lot of hurt/comfort and caring Napoleon, so there's that as well.

After a while tossing the case back and forth between themselves, Napoleon occasionally pausing to write something down for Gaby, they eventually put it down, and Illya starts flicking through the other files. Napoleon heads back towards the kitchen and is picking up where he left off with the cooking when he hears a questioning noise from Illya. He turns to see Illya holding up a file.

“What is this?” he asks. Even from the kitchen, Napoleon knows which file Illya is holding.

“Can you not read my handwriting?” he asks. Illya gives him a look, and Napoleon relents. “It’s the beginnings of a file on Sanders,” he says. “Just the start, but there’s some promising leads. I’ve had years to think of how to dig up dirt on him.”

“Why are you putting this together?” Illya asks, flicking through the few pages that Napoleon put together whilst sitting by Illya’s bed in Medical. It’s not much yet, more of his own notes about what could be potential leads rather than research, but Napoleon’s only just started.

“Why not?” he answers Illya, turning back to the stove. “I don’t think Waverly is going to be able to pin what happened on Sanders, not officially. I might as well get some information that I can use against him if I have to.”

Illya is silent for a long moment. “Why are you doing this, Cowboy?” he asks eventually. “Everything is fine. You don’t need to take down your handler.”

Napoleon arches a brow. “And I’m supposed to just ignore what he’s done to you?” he snaps at Illya. “Christ, Peril, he tried to kill you! He very nearly succeeded, and I’m not going to sit back and give him another damn chance.”

“He won’t try it again,” Illya says, sounding confident. “Not after I’ve survived this attempt. If anything happens to me he knows the KGB and Waverly will look at him first. It’s too dangerous, now.” He studies Napoleon, and Napoleon tries not to look unsettled by it.

“Why are you so bothered by Sanders, Cowboy?” he asks.

“Why aren’t you?” Napoleon shoots back. “Sanders nearly killed you, Peril. I feel you should be a bit more concerned.”

“I’ve had CIA agents try to kill me for years,” Illya replies dryly. “I tend not to take it personally.”

Napoleon clenches his jaw, and concentrates on making the matzoh dumplings for a few moments to stop him shouting. “Please try and put a little value on your own life,” he says once he knows he has control over his own voice. “I’d rather like to keep you around.”

Illya studies Napoleon again. “Come here, Cowboy,” he says eventually.

“I’ve got to keep an eye on the pans,” Napoleon mutters, and Illya gives him a look.

“Napoleon,” he says, his voice suddenly soft, and Napoleon caves. He always will to that tone of voice from Illya, the way he says his name like that. He pads over to Illya on the couch. Illya grabs his hand and tugs him down, and Napoleon folds without even meaning to. He ends up kneeling beside the couch, and doesn’t let go of Illya’s hand.

“You are not responsible for this,” Illya says, tugging a little on Napoleon to emphasise his words. “It is not your fault that I got hurt.”

“It is, though,” Napoleon protests. He can’t help but notice how close he is to Illya, and takes the opportunity to study his face, the slowly fading bruises across his cheek and jaw, the way his hair falls soft across his forehead. He knows that there is more underneath the cotton shirt that stretches slightly across Illya’s chest, bruises and bandages and stitches holding him together.

“This was my handler,” he adds when Illya doesn’t say anything. “They were the people I worked beside for years. And then they did this to you…” He trails off, unable to quite find the words. Illya brings out the truth in him, he thinks.

Illya’s expression turns soft. “Cowboy,” he says, sounding exasperated but fond. “You didn’t betray me, or whatever else you’re thinking in that stupid head of yours. I don’t blame you for this. You are not the CIA, and you are not what the CIA tried to make you.”

Napoleon blinks. He doesn’t know what to say. Illya smiles slightly. “I trust you,” he says. “So fuck the CIA, and fuck Sanders. You’re better without them.”

“Why, Peril,” Napoleon says. “You say the sweetest things.” He leans forwards slightly, and Illya’s gaze dips down to his lips.

There’s a sudden hissing noise from behind him, and Napoleon spins to see the pan bubbling over, spitting and hissing on the stove. He curses and jumps to his feet, hurrying over and pulling the pan off the stove. “Shit,” he mutters, stirring the soup rapidly and blowing on it. He knows the moment is ruined, and there’s no point trying to go back to it.

“Did you burn the soup, Cowboy?” Illya asks, and Napoleon rolls his eyes.

“It almost sounds like you doubt my cooking skills,” he says over his shoulder. “Have you ever known me to burn anything?”

“Yes,” Illya answers promptly. “You tried to make spanakopita from scratch and burnt the pastry.” He grimaces. “Please tell me you’re not trying to make that again.”

“Peril,” Napoleon says, gesturing around the kitchen. “What of all this says spanakopita to you? Have I been making pastry?”

Illya shrugs. “You might have bought pastry,” he says, and Napoleon turns to him, looking aghast.

“You cannot _buy_ pastry,” he protests. “You have to make pastry or there’s no point to it at all.” He fakes a shudder. “It’s almost like you don’t care about cooking, Peril.”

“I don’t,” Illya points out. “But I’ll stomach it if it makes you happy.” Napoleon can’t help but smile at that, even though he knows Illya is just poking fun at him.

“Still feeling sick?” he asks as he puts the matzoh balls into the broth. “A very reliable source has told me this will get you better and not make you throw up.”

“Oh?” Illya asks. “And did you tell this very reliable source I’d had a building blown up on me?” He puts down the file in his hands, tidying away Napoleon’s notes.

Napoleon huffs a laugh. “I told her you’d been hit by a car,” he replies. “It’s close enough, I suppose. She insisted, by the way, that I bring you round to her delicatessen when you’re fit enough. You’ll get mothered by an old Jewish woman who misses her grandchildren, but you’ll get some good food out of it.”

Illya snorts. “Because that’s what we’re really lacking in our lives,” he mutters. “Elderly women trying to feed us.” He stretches slightly, wincing at the pain in his ribs that the movement causes, and tries not to let his eyes fall shut. He fails miserably, the pain medication pulling him under as soon as he lets a little control slip through his fingers.

He wakes to Napoleon gently shaking his shoulder. “Soup’s ready,” he says, and he helps pull Illya upright. Even that movement, after sitting still for so long and letting all his muscles stiffen up, makes him grit his teeth against a yelp of pain. Napoleon gives him a minute to catch his breath and disappears into the kitchen, and Illya forces himself to take slow, even breaths until the pain is manageable.

“Here,” Napoleon says, reappearing with a bowl of soup. “Chicken soup with matzoh balls. If you eat all that and keep it down, I bought you an éclair from that patisserie you like.” Illya tries not to look around for the patisserie box, but Napoleon’s grin makes him think he fails. Napoleon hands him the bowl and a spoon.

“If you spill any on this couch, I will murder you,” he says. “This is vintage.”

Illya rolls his eyes, and tastes the soup. He manages to control his expression a second too late, and Napoleon grins. “I take it you like it, then?” he asks.

Illya gives in to the slight pleading expression that he can just about see in Napoleon’s face, and nods. “It’s good, Cowboy,” he says. “Tell your Jewish grandmother she’s done well.”

“I cooked it,” Napoleon points out as he grabs himself his own bowl and lounges in the armchair next to the couch. “And she’s not my grandmother, just the owner of the delicatessen down the street.”

“She’s an elderly woman who misses her grandchildren,” Illya says dryly. “I’m pretty sure she’s adopted you.” Napoleon snorts in amusement, and there’s a comfortable silence as they eat.

Illya hisses as he tries to move to a more comfortable position, and Napoleon takes the empty bowl from him. “You can’t have more painkillers for another few hours,” he says. “What hurts?”

“Breathing,” Illya says wryly. “I’ll be fine. Pass me a book?”

“Here,” Napoleon says, passing over something on the coffee table. “I brought your favourite from your apartment. It should keep you entertained for a few days, though entertained isn’t the word I would use when it comes to Dostoyevsky.”

Illya flips open the first page of _The Brothers Karamazov_. “That, Cowboy,” he says, “is because you have no class.”

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon jerks awake and nearly falls off the couch, catching himself at the last moment. He spends a moment blinking awake and wondering why exactly he’s on the couch before he remembers and nearly falls off the couch again as he tries to get up. It’s dark, and he guesses it’s a little past midnight. There’s two glasses, holding scotch earlier in the evening, still left on the coffee table from when Gaby came by after finishing work for the day, and the book that Napoleon had fallen asleep reading. Napoleon is about to clear them away, knowing he won’t get to sleep again for an hour or two, when there’s a crash from the bedroom.

His hand goes for a gun that isn’t there in a shoulder holster he’s not wearing, and his next instinct is to dive for the spare pistol he keeps taped beneath the couch. It takes a few seconds for him to readjust, and then he’s running into the bedroom.

In the near darkness it takes a moment for his eyes to adjust, but when they do he rushes forwards. Illya is half slumped over the side of the bed, his whole body shuddering. As he hears Napoleon approach he tries frantically to get up, reaching for a weapon that isn’t there. The lamp is in shards on the bedside table and Illya scrabbles for a weapon, grabbing a shard of the lamp and holding it out in front of him.

Napoleon holds up his hands. “Peril,” he says. “It’s me, okay? You’re safe.”

Illya wavers, eyes wild, and then tries to stand up from the bed. His knees buckle and his casted leg goes from underneath him, and Napoleon darts forward. He catches him just before he falls, and Illya struggles as Napoleon wraps his arms around him, hauling him upright. He’s slurring something in Russian, but Napoleon ignores it.

“Peril,” he says sharply, switching into Russian. “Illya. Come on, you’re in my apartment, you’re safe. It’s Napoleon, it’s just me.” Illya inhales, something that’s almost a sob, and then slumps against Napoleon. He lets go of the glass shard. Napoleon staggers under the sudden weight, but adjusts and gently lowers Illya back down to sit on the bed.

“Easy, Peril,” he says. Illya is still shuddering, hands trembling even as he clenches them into fists. Napoleon sees his throat working and then he lurches forwards, one hand going to his mouth. Napoleon grabs him and hauls him to his feet, taking his weight as he pulls him towards the bathroom. They only just make it before Illya collapses to his knees and starts gagging, violently sick.

The bathroom tiles are cold on Napoleon’s knees as he kneels beside Illya. He puts an arm around Illya’s chest and stops him from falling headfirst into the toilet, but can’t do much else as Illya throws up what little he ate over the past day. By now, Napoleon’s seen various reactions to opioid painkillers, but throwing up with broken ribs is probably one of the worst.

Illya pauses and lets his head fall onto the toilet seat with a groan. “Ribs?” Napoleon asks. Illya nods. He opens his mouth to speak but starts gagging instead, and Napoleon winces as he throws up again. Napoleon can do nothing but rub a hand down Illya’s back and stop him cracking his chin on the porcelain.

Eventually Illya goes limp, slumping against the toilet. His breathing is ragged and he squeezes his eyes shut against the onslaught of pain from his ribs. Napoleon gently pulls him upright until he’s leaning against the cabinets beneath the sink, and even that movement makes him swallow and clench his fists, his throat working as he tries to cling onto the shreds of control he has left.

“I’m going to get your painkillers and a glass of water,” Napoleon says quietly, getting up from the cold tiles. “Just keep breathing steadily, okay? I’ll be right back.”

Illya nods, leaning his head back against the cabinets, and Napoleon runs out into the bedroom to swipe the bottle of pills off the side. Heading back into the bathroom he runs the tap until it’s cold, the sudden sound making Illya jump and then bite off a groan through clenched teeth at the sudden movement.

“Here,” he says, crouching down beside Illya and tapping out two pills. “Take these first.” He tips the pills into Illya’s hand, but it’s shaking so badly that when Illya tries to get the pills to his mouth, they fall out of his hand and onto the floor. Illya mutters a curse, scrabbling to try and pick them up.

Napoleon scoops them up and helps Illya take them, and then holds the glass of water to his lips. “Easy,” he murmurs as Illya gulps down the water. “Peril, take it slowly or you’re just going to start throwing up again.” Illya winces, and slows down.

He groans again, wrapping his arms around himself. “I can’t,” he mutters, the long line of his throat exposed as he tips his head back. “Just…I can’t.” His breathing hitches, his throat working, and he squeezes his eyes shut for a long moment.

“I know,” Napoleon says with a nod. He shifts so he’s sitting on the floor next to Illya, a long line of solid warmth pressing against him. “Still feeling sick, or do you want to get back in bed?”

Illya grimaces. “Give me a minute,” he mutters. He’s still shaking, his hands trembling in his lap. After a moment’s thought, Napoleon reaches over and takes one of his hands, smoothing his thumb over the back of it. He’s always been terrible at controlling his impulses, but Illya doesn’t say anything, just keeps hold of Napoleon.

After a few minutes, Napoleon gently squeezes Illya’s hand. “Come on, you can’t sleep here,” he says. “You’ll be much more comfortable in bed.” Illya cracks open his eyes and nods slightly, and Napoleon pulls him up to his feet. “Easy there,” he murmurs as Illya bites off a moan at the movement. “Just a few steps more.”

It seems to take ages to make it back to the bed, and even longer to get Illya settled. Napoleon notices spots of blood on the sheets, and when he gently unfurls Illya’s clenched fist he finds shallow gashes from the glass shard he’d picked up earlier. As he cleans it out Illya just sits there, jaw clenched as he tries to breathe evenly. Every few seconds his breath stutters, and Napoleon feels worry rise in his throat.

“Nothing feels more broken, does it?” he asks. Wanting to get a closer look at Illya’s chest to see if there’s any more bruising coming up, he flicks on the bedside light.

In the yellow light Illya looks even paler, face washed out. Napoleon realises with alarm that there’s blood on his lips, and he reaches out without thinking. Illya jerks his head away, and Napoleon pauses, hand outstretched.

“There’s blood on your lips,” he says eventually. “If that’s from your lungs, I don’t care what you think, I’m taking you back to Medical.”

Illya shakes his head. “Bit my lip,” he murmurs, wiping the blood away with a shaking hand. “And no, nothing feels more broken than usual.”

“Well, I suppose that’s some minor comfort,” Napoleon says. He hesitates. “What was the dream?”

Illya just shrugs, and then hisses at the movement. “The usual,” he says. “People died.” He sounds tired, but Napoleon recognises the tiredness for that weariness that sinks into their bones and clings to their skin, pulling them down. It’s difficult to shake most of the time, let alone hurting in the middle of the night.

“I saw a child dead in the snow, once,” Illya murmurs, after long moments of silence. “The cold had gotten to him, or hunger or thirst, or some illness I couldn’t see. I walked past. When I’d finished my mission and was heading back, he’d already been buried by the snow.”

This, Napoleon knows. This he is familiar with, this strange game of sorts they play, offering up pieces of themselves in exchange for another truth. If it distracts Illya from the pain that keeps stealing his breath and leaves his hands shaking, then he’ll play it. It’s easier to play in the night, when the shadows hide the shape of his apartment and his tongue is looser.

“There was an entire village bombed out, during the war,” he says softly. “Not very special, we must have walked through a hundred villages just like it through France. But I remember this one, for some reason. Somehow, someone’s laundry was still hanging on a line in a garden, as if it was just waiting for them to come back and take it down, fold up the shirts and iron out the wrinkles.”

Illya nods slowly. “I didn’t see much of the war,” he says. “You know this. I was too young, and Oleg thought I was too valuable to risk. Russian soldiers were cannon fodder. You know this too. But I saw the aftermath of Stalingrad, the end of that front. I think it might have been the first time I dared to think that my country might be wrong, in some way.”

“I first realised there was something wrong with America when I went to war, I think,” Napoleon offers up. “Maybe I knew before, but didn’t want to realise it. But it was war, and nothing’s ever good in that. That’s why I started stealing art. I heard what America did to Japan, and I think I started to run as soon as I realised what it meant.”

Illya hums softly, but doesn’t say anything else. Napoleon goes to get up from the edge of the bed, but finds his wrist suddenly grasped by a hand that’s still trembling. “Stay,” Illya murmurs. “Please. Just…stay.”

Napoleon pauses, and then goes to sit on the other side of the bed. He shifts so he’s pressing close to Illya. He knows what type of nightmares can plague spies, the feeling of blood running through fingers and splashing on the ground, the flutter of someone’s throat as they try desperately to breathe. He knows how large these can be, in the middle of the night.

Illya doesn’t say anything as Napoleon takes his hand again, tracing nonsensical patterns across the back with his thumb. After the years spent in the war, Napoleon knows the immense value in just having someone else nearby, a reassurance that they are still alive and breathing.

Illya shifts slightly, and bites back a groan. “Can you…can you keep talking?” he murmurs.

“One of those dreams, then?” Napoleon asks. He looks over at Illya, notices how he’s still trembling, his eyes flitting around the room. “Describe the room to me.”

Illya rolls his eyes, but the reaction is a few seconds late. “You’re the one meant to be talking, Cowboy,” he mutters.

“Just humour me,” Napoleon says softly, rubbing his thumb across the back of Illya’s hand. “Describe the room.”

“Capitalist decadence?” Illya offers. Napoleon huffs a soft laugh, but gestures for him to continue. Illya sighs. “Cream wallpaper,” he murmurs. “Carpet is…I don’t know, pale gold? Pale blue curtains, matching cover on bed. Rug on the floor is Persian, looks like Qashqai region.”

“It’s Kashan, but good guess,” Napoleon says. “Also, the wallpaper is Navajo white, not cream, if you want to get technical about it. What material is the cover on the bed?”

“Silk,” Illya says after a moment, running it through his fingers. The trembling in his hands has lessened, though is still there. He glances at Napoleon. “I know what you’re doing.”

“And it’s working,” Napoleon points out. He keeps rubbing his thumb across the back of Illya’s hand, slowly and smoothly, giving him something to ground him. Illya draws in a shuddering breath.

“Do you ever wonder what is better?” he murmurs eventually. “Dying in the service of whatever cause we are told to follow, or living through it?”

Napoleon sighs. “You can’t help but wonder about that in the midst of a war,” he replies. “But I think our survival instinct is a little too strong.” He glances over at Illya, wondering what was in the dreams to bring this up. “If it helps,” he says slowly. “You’ve saved a lot of lives over the past year with UNCLE. If you’re looking to balance the scales.”

Illya shakes his head slowly. “We are spies,” he murmurs. “The scales are always tipped against us.”

Napoleon shrugs. “Fair enough, I suppose.” He sighs, and lets himself lean against Illya slightly. During the war, he once woke up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night, thinking his entire company was dead and gone. The soldier sleeping next to him had rolled over in his sleep, half falling onto Napoleon, and the sudden weight and warmth of another human being was enough to reassure him it had just been a dream.

“You know, sometimes I think spies live too long,” Napoleon murmurs. He remembers saying similar words to Illya when he was unconscious in Medical, and though he won’t repeat the whole heartsick speech anytime soon, some parts of it were important, and feel appropriate now.

Illya hums in agreement. “I know,” he says simply. He doesn’t need to say anything more. Napoleon understands.

“We’ve got it good here, though,” Napoleon says. “I think UNCLE is more right than wrong, for the most part. Better than what the CIA could ever be.”

“Better than the KGB,” Illya admits. “Even if the missions are a little more…”

“Insane?” Napoleon offers. “I know. I didn’t realise there were so many people who wanted to destroy the world. Or take it over, for that matter, though it’s alarming how often the two coincide.”

Illya nods in agreement. Napoleon can see that the pain medication kicking in, and Illya is struggling to stay awake. “You can go to sleep,” he says. “I’ll stay here.”

“Can you…can you keep talking?” Illya murmurs.

“I never knew you liked the sound of my voice so much,” Napoleon says with a smile. “But yes, I’ll keep talking.” He picks up a book from the bedside table, opens it to a random page, and starts reading.

“ _He stood breathing,”_ he reads, _“and the more he breathed the land in, the more he was filled up with all the details of the land. He was not empty. There was more than enough here to fill him. There would always be more than enough._ ”

Illya falls asleep to the low pitch of Napoleon’s voice, and the rustling of pages.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spanakopita is a Greek recipe involving a lot of filo pastry, spinach and feta cheese- it's actually really nice, if fiddly and time-consuming to make.
> 
> There's actually a scientific reason for why it's a lot easier to tell people secrets at night? It's something to do with the chemical make up of our brains, and how it changes when it gets dark (bc of our circadian rhythm and everything). I read this in New Scientist, but years ago, so I can't remember the exact facts. But yeah, it's weirdly easy to tell people everything at three in the morning (which I know from experience).
> 
> The book that Napoleon is reading from is Farenheit 451, which is an excellent book (and comes up again later on in the story, along with some Tennyson and Russian literature- this is what happens when you have a relative doing a degree in literature, you absorb a lot of knowledge by osmosis).
> 
> As always, each and every kudos and comment is wonderful, and gives me life!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plenty of pining Napoleon so far, but now we get some pining Illya as well. I must admit, after writing the first story that was almost purely from Napoleon's pov (and when it was from Illya's, he was either dying or on a lot of drugs, which makes the pov very different to normal) writing a prolonged pov for Illya was surprisingly difficult! But never mind, it all worked out once I worked away at it enough.

There’s a knock at the door, and after Napoleon goes through the various security measures in place, he opens it to find Gaby on the other side. She blinks upon seeing him. “Well, you look like hell.”

Napoleon lets her in, rubbing a hand over the stubble he hasn’t bothered to shave off yet. He’s still just in the cotton shirt and pants he changed into once Illya had fallen asleep, though he’d sat back on the other side of the bed and fallen asleep there, instead of retreating to the spare room. “Rough night,” he murmurs as he locks the door behind her. “Be quiet, Peril is asleep and I don’t want to wake him up.”

“What happened?” Gaby asks, taking in the broken lamp sitting in pieces on the coffee table. “Are you hurt?”

“What?” Napoleon asks. “No, I’m fine. The lamp was the only casualty of last night.” He heads into the kitchen and starts to make coffee. “Help yourself to breakfast if you want it.”

Gaby sits at the table and pulls a bowl of fruit towards her. “I’ll ask again,” she says. “What happened?”

Napoleon sighs, measuring out a scoop of ground coffee. “Bad dreams.”

“Is that all?” Gaby asks. “You look like you didn’t get any sleep last night.”

Napoleon levels her with a look. He wants to go back to sleep, or failing that, sit down with a book and make sure Illya gets enough rest, but Gaby is looking at him and expecting an answer. “When you have a history like Peril’s,” he says eventually, “bad dreams aren’t just bad dreams.” He’s not going to mention anything more, how the ghosts of people they couldn’t save haunt anyone who spends too long in this game, or how late at night it’s so easy for the world to become disjointed and fracture. There are plenty of weak points for stress fractures to splinter out from, for anyone in the game for as long as he and Illya have been.

Gaby nods, and meticulously peels a tangerine. “I can’t stay for long,” she says. “I just popped by to see how you were before heading into the office. Waverly has me working on some smuggling case.”

Napoleon smiles slightly. “It’s somewhat reassuring,” he says. “No matter what’s going on in the world, there’s always going to be some idiot trying to sneak illegal things from one country to another.” Or in his case, an extremely talented thief. He’d spent two months working with some antiques smugglers in Naples once, though working probably wasn’t the right word. Even now, he’s not sure if he was ever entirely sober at any point during those two months.

“Yes, well it still makes things difficult for us,” Gaby points out. “I’m sure you had the time of your life smuggling art across various countries, but you’re a respected UNCLE agent now.”

Napoleon laughs. “Darling, I don’t think I’ll ever be a respected anything,” he says. “I was, and always will be, a thief at heart.”

Gaby laughs, and tosses an orange segment at Napoleon’s head. He catches it and eats it with a grin. “So,” she says, drawing the word out. “You want to get out.”

“Out of what?” Napoleon asks, pouring himself a coffee and sitting down opposite Gaby. He knows what she’s going to say before she even says it.

“Don’t play dumb with me, Solo,” Gaby says. “You want Waverly to pull you out of the CIA and to make you a full UNCLE agent. You’ve asked that the same be offered to Illya as well.” She studies Napoleon with her fierce brown eyes. “I may be new to this game, Solo, but even I know that it’s a bad idea to become emotionally attached.”

“Really, Gaby?” Napoleon asks, his smile sharp and brittle. “I hadn’t realised how much of a fucking mess it makes everything. Thanks for pointing it all out to me.”

Gaby rolls her eyes. “You can drop the attitude,” she says sharply. “I’m just saying that you might be compromised when it comes to this.”

Napoleon laughs bitterly, and looks down at his coffee. “I know,” he says. “But I can’t work under the CIA anymore, not after what they’ve done.”

“What, meddling in international affairs and helping Latin American countries orchestrate coups is fine, but they touch your partner and it’s too much?” Gaby asks. Napoleon crushes the sudden irrational urge to slam his hand down on the table or throw a punch at the wall, and arches a brow.

“Not pulling any punches there,” he remarks, his voice icy. “You think I was anything more than a thief and a whore for the CIA? You think I wanted to work with them? It was that or a prison sentence.” He’d taken the sentence under the CIA even knowing what they would think of him and what they’d likely make him do, because at least with the CIA he could pretend he was free somehow, pretend like he had the option of running.

“But you were their best,” Gaby points out. “Their most successful agent.”

Napoleon shakes his head. “I’m very good at what I do,” he admits. “And I did my best for them because anything else would land me in prison or a grave. But I didn’t like it, not often.” It wasn’t all bad; there were of course times that he felt the thrill of the mission, and he still has friends in the CIA, but the past year in UNCLE has given a new perspective.

“I can’t get out of the game,” he says as Gaby stares at him. “Neither can Illya. We’re tied to this life for as long as we’re useful, and the moment we’re not we’ll be dead. That’s just how it works. UNCLE is the best thing we’re going to get in this godawful game, and I’ve seen the other options. I want to keep this for as long as I can.”

Gaby’s expression softens. “Waverly won’t let either of you go anytime soon,” she tells him. “But you are compromised, Solo, and you will always be when it comes to Illya.” She sighs slightly. “Have you told him?”

“Told him what?” Napoleon asks. “That I love him? No, and I’m not going to. I’d rather not get punched in the face.”

Gaby rolls her eyes. “He won’t punch you,” she says. “And you can’t just hide everything behind your usual suits and sunglasses. This is Illya we’re talking about. I think he has a right to know.”

“And I have a right to decide whether or not I want to screw everything up,” Napoleon snaps back at her. “I know, goddammit I know that I’m compromised, but I won’t compromise Illya, or our partnership or any of the missions we go on because I’m fucking heartsick or something.” Gaby goes to say something but he cuts her off. “Leave it,” he snaps. “This world is dangerous enough without me adding to it.”

“Besides,” he says after a few moments, feeling the weight of Gaby’s gaze. “I don’t think Illya remembers anything from that night, and he certainly didn’t say anything that was definite.” Illya thought he was dying, and Napoleon knows people say things they don’t mean when they think they’re going to die. He’s not going to hold that over Illya.

“He’s badly hurt, and high on painkillers,” he adds as well. “I won’t take advantage of that.”

“Fine,” Gaby says, giving Napoleon a look. Napoleon just returns it. He’s had plenty of practice, and Gaby is feisty but a year in this game is not enough practice for her yet. He’s sure that she’ll become better than both him and Illya in a few years, but not yet.

“Any thoughts on some of the cases yet?” she asks, changing the subject. She’d noticed the files sitting on the coffee table as she had walked in.

“Oh, Peril thinks we should get an in with the gang in Brazil that’s receiving money,” Napoleon says in reply. “He suggested asking the CIA for a local agent, but given the money is from an American source they might be in on it. If that’s the case, then going to the military or the local secret service will be a better idea. Get an older man to become a mentor of sorts to one of the younger kids in the gang, and they’ll feel indebted to the man and give us an in.”

Gaby nods. “I’ll get a team on it,” she says, getting to her feet. “And I should get going into work. Let Illya know I stopped by, will you? And I’ll bring you some more case files to look at this evening, and some food as well. Chinese, I think, because that’s the only place I know around here.”

“You do know how to spoil me,” Napoleon says with a smile, pressing a kiss to Gaby’s cheek. “Make sure UNCLE doesn’t burst into flames whilst we’re not there.”

“Darling, the chances of that happening rise exponentially as soon as you and Illya walk through the door,” Gaby says. “Don’t spend too long away, though, will you? It’s much more exciting with the two of you around.”

0-o-0-o-0

When Gaby arrives in the evening, Illya is contemplating whether to be merciful or just annihilate his partner. He pauses as Napoleon gets up to open the door, rolling the bishop back and forth between his fingers, and smiles as Gaby comes in with a bag that smells suspiciously like Chinese food.

“Not for you,” Napoleon chides as Illya reaches for the bag. “You can have more soup, and maybe some plain toast.”

“Cowboy, you cannot be serious,” Illya protests, but Napoleon moves the bag out of his reach. Illya glares at him, and places his bishop down on the chess board. “Checkmate,” he says, and feels vindicated when Napoleon gapes at the board.

“No way,” he mutters. “You’re high on opioid painkillers, how can you possibly beat me in twelve moves?” He sighs, and tips his king over. “See what I have to deal with here, Gaby?”

Gaby smiles and walks over, pressing a kiss to Illya’s cheek. “Chop shop girl,” Illya says fondly. “Keeping the world running whilst we’re not there?”

“Believe me, it’s a lot easier keeping the peace at UNCLE without the two of you,” Gaby says with a wicked smile. “Andrysiak asked after you, Illya.”

Illya hums, and Gaby gives him a look. “He was very helpful,” she chides. “You don’t have to immediately dislike him.” She takes out the various containers of takeout from the bag and sets them out on the coffee table as Napoleon brings over plates. He sighs heavily.

“Gaby, that coffee table cost me more than your dress, and I know you’re wearing Rabanne,” Napoleon says wearily. “Put mats under those containers. Please.”

Illya snorts, and then winces as his ribs protest. Napoleon gives him a look, and hands him two painkillers along with the bowl of soup. “Andrysiak knows you,” he mentions to Illya as he hands Gaby a plate. “From before UNCLE, I mean.”

Illya raises his brows. “I don’t remember him.”

“I doubt you would,” Napoleon says. “He was an _SB-eck_ before UNCLE, and apparently spent a few months in Moscow back when you were training.” Gaby frowns, and he turns to her. “Polish Security Bureau,” he explains. “That’s the nickname for their security officers.”

Illya shrugs, and takes a mouthful of soup. “Probably,” he says to Napoleon. “Oleg liked to bring in officials or visiting agents to watch when I was training. Never met them unless it was someone important in the Kremlin, so could have been Andrysiak once.” He sips at his soup, and wonders if he can sneak a spring roll off the table without Napoleon noticing. It’s unlikely. He’s well aware of how slow his injuries and the drugs he’s on have made him.

Gaby takes pity on him after a few minutes, and hands him a spring roll when Napoleon goes to get more drinks. “I grew up in East Berlin. I lived on nothing but soup for two weeks, once,” she says with a grin as she hands it over. “Even Napoleon’s cooking gets boring after the same thing for days.”

“You have not been in spetsnaz,” Illya says, biting into the spring roll. “We were sent out into Siberia for month with only two weeks of ration packs. We had to find rest of food ourselves. Compared to that, anything Napoleon cooks is worth eating.”

“I’ll take that compliment,” Napoleon says, coming back into the room. “Even if you just compared my cooking to animals you killed with your bare hands in the midst of Siberia.” He glares at Gaby as he spots the spring roll in Illya’s hand. “You’re not the one still here in the middle of the night when the side effects of the painkillers kick in,” he says to her.

Gaby rolls her eyes. “He’ll be fine, Solo,” she says. “It’s one spring roll.”

Illya tunes the two of them out as they bicker, and studies the chess board still on the coffee table. He only manages to eat about half the spring roll before he starts feeling sick, but just to spite Napoleon eats the rest of it anyway.

They talk shop for a while, Gaby filling the both of them in on the new cases. Soon enough it devolves into gossip, which is inevitable with Napoleon and Gaby. Illya mostly just listens to it all, trying to ignore the way he can hear his pulse in his ears and how his leg itches beneath the cast.

It’s late, and dark outside, when Gaby gets to her feet. “Well boys, it’s been lovely but I must get going,” she says. “Waverly has me on a plane to Paris tomorrow, trying to track down some of these smuggled antiques.”

“Please don’t tell me you’re going to the Louvre,” Napoleon says, and Illya huffs a laugh at his pout as Gaby nods. “You have the worst timing, Peril,” he tells Illya. “I could be going to the Louvre right now.” Illya rolls his eyes, because he knows that Napoleon doesn’t mean any of it.

“Don’t blame me,” he points out. “I didn’t decide any of this. Also, Waverly wouldn’t let you anywhere close to Louvre. Your fingers are too sticky, and we would have _gendarmerie_ after us when you steal something.” Napoleon is good enough to just consider it and then shrug.

“Fair enough,” he says. “They have some lovely early Ma Yuan works down in their basement that seem to barely see the light of day. Just because a painter is less well known and not Western, doesn’t mean that their works shouldn’t be celebrated.”

“I’m sure,” Gaby says, placating. “But you’re not going, so you’ll just have to look at all your other stolen paintings for now.” She presses a kiss to his cheek, and then Illya’s. “I’ll call when I’m back from Paris.”

“Make sure you go shopping whilst you’re there,” Napoleon says. “Go to l’Avenue des Champs Elysées, you’re guaranteed to find something there.”

“Or la Rue Saint-Honoré,” Illya adds. “In first arrondissement. Plenty of boutiques, and I think Balenciaga has shop there, yes?” Napoleon nods, already up and gathering up the takeout containers and plates left on the coffee table.

“Boys,” Gaby says. “I’m sure I’ll find something, and I’ll make sure to bring it back so you can both okay it before I’m actually allowed to put it on. Now I really must be off. Illya, be good for Solo. Solo, try not to drive Illya to kill you.” Napoleon laughs, and Gaby smiles. “Look after each other, boys,” she says over her shoulder as she leaves.

Napoleon glances at Illya as he puts the plates in the kitchen. “That spring roll made you feel sick, didn’t it,” he says, and it’s not a question so Illya doesn’t answer. Napoleon laughs, and gets him a glass of water. “Drink it slowly,” he says. “I don’t want to be up half the night as you try to break another rib if I don’t have to.”

Illya grimaces. “Sorry for last night, Cowboy,” he mutters, and Napoleon’s expression, surprisingly, softens.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” he says. “I’ve been there before.” Illya nods, and sips more of his water. He’s woken Napoleon from nightmares before, usually about the war or being tortured by Rudi in that chair. It’s nothing uncommon, to spies who have been in the game as long as they have.

“Ma Yuan, Cowboy?” Illya asks. “Who was that?”

He can’t help but smile as Napoleon’s eyes light up. “Ma Yuan was a Chinese painter of the Song Dynasty. They’ve found and preserved a fair few of his paintings over the years.” He pauses. “I don’t have any of his paintings here, the two early works I have are in another safehouse elsewhere, but I do have an image or two somewhere. Give me a moment.”

He disappears into the bedroom, and Illya watches as he reappears a few moments later, a large book in his hands. Napoleon puts in on the coffee table and flicks through the pages eagerly.

“Art book?” Illya asks, leaning forwards as much as he can without his ribs protesting too much. “I thought you hated them.”

“Hate is such a strong word, Peril,” Napoleon says over his shoulder as he tries to find the right page. “I just think they’re insufficient to show the real beauty of a piece of art. A friend of mine, a forger I knew in Japan, gave this to me when I left as a joke. It’s full of oriental art, and Ma Yuan’s pieces will be in here somewhere.”

He makes a triumphant noise, and pulls the book over to Illya, sitting down in the armchair next to the couch. Illya sits up as best he can, pulling himself up with the arm of the couch so he can see the book properly. It’s open to the image of am old painting, black ink on what looks like parchment or silk.

“This is probably his most well-known work,” Napoleon says, and Illya reads the inscription underneath: _Walking on a Mountain Path in Spring._ “Look at how Ma Yuan draws your eye first to this corner, the asymmetry of the detail concentrated here. And then you look to the empty spaces to see what’s missing, and you see the calligraphy. He’s asking you to imagine the sky and the clouds, the rest of the mountain range that you can see fading from view.”

Illya traces the calligraphy in the corner, the Chinese characters inked hundreds of years ago. “What does this mean?” he asks.

“ _The wild flowers dance when brushed by my sleeves_ ,” Napoleon recites, not taking his eyes from the picture. “ _Reclusive birds make no sound as they shun the presence of people._ It sounds better in the original Chinese, of course, but I don’t know that dialect well, and I’d only mangle the pronunciation.”

He leans forwards, flicking through a few more pages of the book. “I love western art, of course, but there is something about old Oriental art,” he says. “Look at the brushstrokes on this, the way he’s created these broad, frayed lines by holding the brush at an angle to the silk. The romantics were something he really introduced, in a way, to Chinese paintings.” He turns the page to a delicate painting of flower blossoms. “Look at the detail of this. He moves from large landscapes and his favoured asymmetry to something as intricate as a branch of blossom, and both are executed beautifully.”

Illya hums, and traces the branch down the page. “I spent three weeks in Taiwan, a few years back,” he murmurs. “I tailed a mark into the National Palace Museum in Taipei, and spent hours following the man around.” He taps the image of the blossom. “I saw these there.”

Napoleon looks over at him. “They’re even more beautiful in person, aren’t they?” he says.

Illya nods. He suddenly realises how close he’s sitting to Napoleon. Napoleon turns back to the book, flicking through and pointing out some of his favourites, but Illya can’t stop looking at Napoleon. The sudden urge to kiss him almost makes him lean forwards, but he wrests back control before moving more than an inch. He can’t lose control. He doesn’t know what will happen if he does.

He doesn’t remember much at all from that night, only the taste of ash and blood on his lips and the feeling of Napoleon’s hand in his. He doesn’t want to think about it too much, because if he does then he knows he’ll remember more, and he doesn’t think he wants to. He’s seen enough people die, or come close to it, to know that he could have confessed anything to Napoleon on that street. Given Napoleon hasn’t brought it up at all, he thinks it must mean he didn’t say anything, or he did and Napoleon doesn’t feel the same, and is hoping he doesn’t remember.

_One more moment,_ Illya thinks. _And then one more._ If that’s all he ever gets with Napoleon, he thinks he could be content, eventually. He’ll always ache for more, always wish to be able to run his hands through Napoleon’s hair and tease the curls at the nape of his neck, or to be able to turn and press a kiss to his lips for merely existing, but to just stay with him is enough.

He surfaces from his thoughts to Napoleon gently shaking his shoulder, an amused quirk to his lips. “Either the painkillers are getting to you, or you’re bored by art,” he says. “Either way, you should probably go to bed.”

Illya just nods. He can feel the painkillers pulling him down, and he knows that falling asleep on the couch will leave him even worse off than usual in the morning. “Come on, let’s get you up,” Napoleon says. “Bathroom first?”

Illya grunts an affirmative. Sometimes he hates this, being so dependent on Napoleon to even get around the apartment. Trying to take a shower this morning had been excruciating, both because he had to balance on one leg, the other with plastic wrapped around it to keep the cast dry, and every movement badly jarred his ribs, but also because Napoleon had been hovering outside the bathroom the entire time, worried that Illya was somehow going to kill himself by taking a shower.

Napoleon helps him get to the bathroom and then thankfully leaves him alone. By the time Illya’s finished and changed into a fresh shirt and pyjama pants that had been left in the bathroom, Napoleon wanders back into the bedroom with the book of art. He slots it back into its place on the bookshelf that spans one entire wall of the room.

“Cowboy,” Illya says, limping from the bathroom doorway to the edge of the bed and collapsing down on it with a sigh. Napoleon spins towards him, and Illya huffs a laugh. “I’m fine,” he mutters with a wry smirk. “Don’t look so worried. Just wanted to say…the art is not boring.”

“Oh.” Napoleon grins. “Well I’m glad, Peril. We’ll make a civilised person out of you yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gaby continues to slap sense into Napoleon- we all need someone like Gaby at times. And poor Illya is pining just as much as Napoleon is.
> 
> There is actually a Balenciaga shop on la Rue Saint-Honoré, I checked on google maps. And Ma Yuan is a very famous Chinese artist in the early 1200s, and has done some beautiful paintings. Every one described in this chapter are real, and the cherry blossom ones are actually in the museum in Taipei. I couldn't find out if they were there in the sixties, but I did try. I'm probably taking the realism a little too far in this story, but never mind.
> 
> There will be actual plot soon enough, but I found writing this domestic fluff so much fun, and so different to what I normally write, that I got a bit sucked in.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last bit of domestic fluff before the plot kicks in, so enjoy....
> 
> Technically, the real plot kicks in a few chapters from now (when I say real plot, I mean events that happen from outside the two of them) but it does go somewhat downhill from here.

Napoleon first goes back into headquarters a week after taking Illya back to his penthouse. He drops a disgruntled Illya at Medical for check ups and the beginnings of physical therapy, and then heads up to his office. After just over two weeks since Illya was hurt, the paperwork has stacked up. Napoleon knows it would have been even worse if some of the secretaries hadn’t taken pity on him and Illya and taken up a lot of the slack, or if Gaby hadn’t been around.

Still, he spends three hours sorting through and finishing the most important pieces of work before he has to take a break. He’s walking down the corridor to get coffee when there’s the clack of heels behind him, and he turns to see Deena, Waverly’s secretary, hurrying towards him.

“Solo,” she says with a smile. “Glad to see you back. How’s Illya?”

“Annoyed that he has to go back into Medical for physical therapy,” Napoleon says, offering to take some of the files Deena is carrying. She hands him a stack with a grateful smile.

“Do they know whether he’ll get back to full field agent status?” she asks, and Napoleon manages to keep the easy smile on his face. Deena must notice a change, though, because she frowns slightly. “Do they not know yet?” she asks. “Word amongst the secretaries is that he’ll be back in a couple of months.”

“Ah, well you can never trust anything that comes out of your gossip pool,” Napoleon points out. He shifts the stack of files in his arms, and sighs slightly. “They’re optimistic, I think, but they don’t know. A lot of damage was done. I suppose they’ll know more after doing all the x-rays and tests today.”

Deena gives Napoleon a pitying look, and briefly Napoleon wonders if the entire office knows how far he’s fallen for Illya. “You’ll make yourself sick with your worrying,” she says. “Illya will be fine. He has got someone looking after him, hasn’t he?”

“He’s staying with me for the moment,” Napoleon answers, and Deena smiles.

“Well, if you’re looking out for him, then I’m sure he’ll be right in no time,” she says. She pauses by the door to one of the copy rooms.

“I’m his partner, of course I’m looking out for him,” Napoleon says automatically. He hands the files back to Deena. “Speaking of, I should probably go and make sure he hasn’t tried to murder any of the doctors. It’s only a matter of time.” He takes Deena’s hand and presses a kiss to it, winking at her to try and get himself back on balance somewhat, before turning and walking down towards the lift.

Deena watches him walk away, shaking her head slightly, and then ducks into the copy room. A few other secretaries are there, and Deena leans on the Xerox machine. “That boy is as heartsick as I’ve ever seen,” she says to the room at large.

“You talking about Solo?” someone else asks. She puts down her work and sits on the edge of the bench. “The poor boy, I thought we were going to lose the both of them over all this mess. Don’t think he would have stuck around for long if his partner had died.”

“That boy,” a third says with a shake of her head, chiming in. “You think his partner returns the feelings?”

“Oh, I’m sure he does,” Deena says. “Have you seen the two of them around each other? Illya lives up to his KGB reputation right up until Solo comes along, and then he melts. There’s no way that boy isn’t just as heartsick as Solo.”

“And yet neither of them will say anything,” one says with a sigh. “They really are making this so much more difficult than they have to.”

“We could do something,” another suggests. “Nudge them towards each other.”

“Girl, they’re so dense about each other that they need much more of a sledgehammer than a nudge,” Deena says with a shake of her head. “Don’t forget Illya is Russian, and KGB on top of that.”

“Russian and American,” one says with a quirk of her lips. “Never would have thought that it would be those two falling for each other.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” another muses. “I think I saw it coming a while back. Remember when there was that disaster of a mission in Greece and they staggered back here for a couple weeks of rest? Even then you could see how Illya was looking at Solo with nothing but adoration, and bless him, Solo looked like he never wanted to leave Illya’s side.”

“You know they’re living together?” Deena asks. There are a few raised brows, and she nods. “Solo just told me himself. Only until Illya is back on his feet, apparently, but hopefully by then they’ll have sorted themselves out.”

“If not, I’m sure we can help them out,” one of the secretaries says. “Oh, that reminds me. Deena, my friend Matt at Langley came through for me.” She pulled out a file from underneath a stack of paper and hands it over. “Anything we can do to help those boys out. I think they’ve earned it.”

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon walks into the physical therapy room in Medical to find Illya trying to stare down a doctor. It’s not very successful when Illya is in a wheelchair and is trembling, wearing what looks like a set of spare Medical clothes. The shirt he’d been wearing this morning is in his lap, and is soaked with sweat. Napoleon sighs, and walks further into the room.

“I hope he hasn’t given you too much trouble,” he tells the doctor. “Peril, didn’t I tell you to be nice?”

Illya glares at the doctor and crosses his arms. Napoleon runs his hand over his face, and turns to the doctor. “Well?”

“Agent Kuryakin needs to recognise his own limitations,” the doctor says, sounding like he’s trying very hard to keep his voice even and level. “Recovery will be a long process, and he’s already exhausted himself. He absolutely cannot do anymore physical therapy today.”

Illya huffs. “In KGB, would be training all day,” he mutters. “Pain is not a concern.”

“Yes, well we’re not in the KGB right now,” Napoleon points out. “And pain is definitely a concern if you overdo it and do some damage.” Illya turns his glare on him, and Napoleon stares him down. “Stop being so damn impatient.”

“The breaks are all healing well,” the doctor says when Illya doesn’t reply. “The cast on the leg should be able to come off in three weeks, but he’ll be on crutches for a while, and will have a limp for longer. With intense, but properly managed,” at that he shot a look at Illya, “physical therapy, I think he’ll make a full recovery.”

Napoleon breathes a sigh of relief. “Good,” he says, clasping Illya’s shoulder. “Let’s get you something to eat, and then you can crash on my couch until we head home.” The doctor leaves them alone, and Napoleon endures Illya’s glares as he wheels him towards the door.

“You need to be more careful,” he chides him as they get in the elevator. “Look at you, you’re exhausted. If you do this every day you’re just going to damage yourself.”

“KGB would have started training two days ago,” Illya says, even as he slumps in the wheelchair, muscles trembling with exhaustion.

“Like I said, we’re not in the KGB,” Napoleon snaps. “And it’s not training, it’s physical therapy. What the KGB would do to you would probably count as torture under some countries, and you know it.”

Illya pauses, and Napoleon grimaces slightly at the heat in his own voice. “I need you as my partner,” he says. “And that means I need you to not damage yourself chasing these ridiculous goals you have for getting better. You’re not in the KGB right now. You can afford to take some time to heal, and nobody will punish you for it.”

Illya sighs, and slumps further into the wheelchair, and just like that Napoleon knows he’s won, for now. “Let’s just get food, Cowboy,” he murmurs.

Napoleon opts for grabbing sandwiches from the canteen and taking them up to their office, rather than making Illya endure the stares of everyone in the canteen. Spies are a gossipy bunch by nature, and he knows Illya would hate it.

They talk shop in their office over lunch, Illya flipping through a few of the files on Napoleon’s desk. Napoleon tries to help him out of the wheelchair and onto the couch, but Illya shoves him off and insists on doing it himself. “Leave it,” he snaps when he wavers and Napoleon goes to grab his arm. “I can cope.”

Napoleon holds up his hands and backs off. “Fine,” he says, sitting down at his desk. “I’ll leave it. Shout when you get over your attitude problem.”

Illya manages to stay angry for all of half an hour before exhaustion pulls him under. At his desk, Napoleon glances up from his work to see Illya fast asleep, slumped over the side of the couch. He sighs and gets up. Illya doesn’t even stir when Napoleon gently rearranges him so he’s spread out across the couch, propped up by as many cushions as Napoleon can scrounge from around the office.

Deena drops off some files from Waverly in the afternoon, and smiles when she sees Illya fast asleep on the couch. “How long has he been out?” she asks softly.

Napoleon huffs a laugh. “A good hour, now,” he replies. “Exhausted himself with physical therapy, and it’s only the first session.”

Deena clucks sympathetically. “I suppose he’s KGB,” she says. “Doesn’t know how to step off the gas, I guess.” She pats Napoleon’s shoulder. “Don’t you worry about him, all the girls know to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn’t overdo it.”

Napoleon sighs, running a hand over his face. “Any good news for me?” he asks.

“One of the girls knows someone who owes a favour, you know how it is,” Deena replies. “We might have something for you, but give us a little more time to make sure.”

“I’m very grateful,” Napoleon says, looking up at her. “I wouldn’t normally go behind Waverly’s back like this, but just in case he can’t find anything, I have to…I need something to keep him safe. Just in case.”

“It’s alright, Solo,” Deena says. “I understand. We’ll keep it under wraps easily enough until you need it.” She gathers up a few pieces of paperwork that Napoleon has finished. “Don’t think this is going to become normal,” she warns. “Just until everything’s back on track.”

“Of course, Deena,” Napoleon says with a smile. “But thank you anyway. I’ll owe you one.”

Deena gives him a smile and a last pitying look at Illya before she leaves. It’s a mark of how much Illya exhausted himself that he didn’t wake up when Deena came in. Napoleon has seen him crash on this couch after one awful mission or another, and still jerk awake as soon as the door opened and someone came into the office, but apparently the hell that is physical therapy is enough to keep him under, for now.

Still, Napoleon is struck by how young Illya looks when he’s asleep, how the deadliness that usually lines his face softens out. Illya has shifted in his sleep so his face is half pressed into a cushion, one hand tucked under his head. He shivers slightly, and Napoleon takes the overcoat slung over the back of his chair in place of a blanket. He tucks it over Illya, careful to not wake him up, and smiles softly when Illya just grabs the coat in his sleep and pulls it closer.

If he could keep this moment, then he knows he would. If he could just have this, this quiet comfort of Illya asleep under his coat, exhausted but whole and alive and healing, then he knows he would give far more than he rationally should to keep hold of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you go, that's the last fluff you're going to get for a few chapters....
> 
> Don't worry, I'm not that evil (maybe).
> 
> Also, Deena and the group of secretaries gossiping about the two of them are literally the personification of my shipper's heart.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the delay!! My laptop broke literally the day after posting the last chapter, and it's taken until now to get it fixed. Unfortunately I write everything on Word and don't have copies in other places beyond backing up on hard drives, so I couldn't access any of it. It sucked, but the laptop is back, fixed and updated, so here's a new chapter!
> 
> This is where it goes downhill. I think some of you are overestimating how bad this is going to get, based on the first story, so let me appease some of your fears- it's definitely not going to be as heartbreaking as the first story of this series, as that was pretty bad! This is a story about recovery and people coming together. There are bumps in the road, but they're not the size of mountains.

In hindsight, Napoleon knows he should have seen it coming.

He sits down on his couch, glass of scotch in his hand, and stares at it for a moment before throwing back the entire thing in one go. There’s a brief temptation to throw the empty glass at the wall just to watch it shatter, but it disappears just as quickly as it arises, and he merely slumps back onto the couch.

He should have seen it coming.

For the first two weeks or so that he’d gone back to work, it had been going surprisingly well. Every day he would drop Illya off for physical therapy at Medical, go up to his office to work for a few hours, and then pick Illya up, usually cutting off an argument between him and the therapists. Illya would then crash on the couch for a couple of hours and then do what work he could before they headed home. It had been simple, and left enough time in the evening for a chess game or two before Illya crashed again, having predictably overworked himself during physical therapy.

Napoleon supposes it started to go downhill when Illya was recovered enough to ditch the wheelchair with Medical, and took himself off the opioids before Medical really said he should. Illya off painkillers, trying to walk on a leg that wasn’t technically broken but definitely not healed yet, was even worse than usual to deal with.

Napoleon wonders now if it might have been better to help Illya move back into his own apartment, but for all his determination Illya had still needed a fair amount of help, and besides, Napoleon had been feeling selfish. For a few weeks he’d entertained the brief fantasy that he would do something, make some sort of move, and then Illya would reciprocate and it would all work out.

He knows it’s a stupid fantasy, especially for a thief and a spy, but sometimes he can’t help himself. He thinks it’s one of the reasons he stole art, why he still has the old copy of Tennyson’s poetry he first read during the war on the bookshelf in his bedroom. He hides it well, but he’s a romantic at heart.

There’s a rap at his door, and Napoleon sighs, heading to pour himself another drink first. He’s only just picked up the decanter when there’s a sharp voice on the other side of the door.

“Solo!” Gaby snaps. “Let me in, or so help me I will break this door down.”

Napoleon sighs, and hangs his head. Another pounding on the door makes him head over. Whilst he knows this door is reinforced, he also doesn’t doubt Gaby’s tenacity and determination, and suspects she might very well blow the door in if she has to.

“You idiot,” she snaps as soon as he opens the door, and pushes past him into his apartment.

“No, please, come in,” Napoleon mutters, and he heads straight for the drink he’d been pouring. “What have I done now?”

Gaby glares at him, hands on her hips. “I think I’d like to know why Illya called me from a payphone asking me to pick him up and take him back to his own apartment,” she says. “What the hell happened?”

Napoleon pours himself another scotch. “Hasn’t he already told you?” he asked. “Seeing as you’ve run all the way over here to scold me.”

“I actually came to pick up his belongings,” Gaby snaps. She walks over and plucks the drink out of Napoleon’s hands. Napoleon shrugs and gets another glass from the side, and Gaby glares at him. “Goddammit, Solo, what the hell is wrong with you?”

“You’ll have to make a list,” Napoleon says humourlessly. “There’s too much to remember off the top of my head.”

Gaby takes a deep breath, and sets down her handbag and the glass of scotch. She marches up to Napoleon and he can’t even find it in himself to be amused by how she has to tilt her head to look up at him. “Are you drunk, or do you just not care?” she asks.

Napoleon shrugs again. “Bit of both.”

Gaby slaps him.

“How _dare_ you,” she hisses. “After everything that has happened? How dare you say that you don’t care? You love him!”

“Yes, I don’t need reminding of that!” Napoleon snaps, rubbing his cheek. “You don’t get to tell me how to live my life, Gaby. You have no idea what it’s been like.”

“Oh, so you’ve had a hard life,” Gaby says, sounding completely unsympathetic. “Well so has everyone in this damn game. Nobody ends up in this life because they think they’re going to have a good time, so it doesn’t give you the right to act like a complete arse!” She shoves him in the chest, and Napoleon is actually so surprised that he takes a couple of steps back. “I know what you said to him, Solo, and that wasn’t just heartless, it was cruel! Do you know how upset he is?”

“It wasn’t just me,” Napoleon points out. “It takes two people to have an argument.”

“I’m sure it does, but you can be particularly cruel,” Gaby says. “I never thought you’d even mention Illya’s father like you did, just to get leverage over him?” Napoleon winces. He’s not proud of that one at all, bringing up Illya’s parents because Illya had snapped something about him deserting the army to run away, and how he had no loyalty to anyone but himself, and it had hurt him more than Napoleon likes to admit, even to himself.

“That was…I got carried away,” Napoleon says, and the excuse sounds weak to his own ears. Gaby’s glare deepens.

“That is not an excuse!” she shouts at him. “You do not get to pass over this because you got carried away! This is your fucking fault, Solo. Sure, Illya is also to blame for all this, and he can’t control his temper either, but that’s not an excuse! You have to own up to this, or you’re never going to fix all of this.”

“Fucking hell, Gaby,” Napoleon murmurs, turning away from her. “Can’t you leave it alone?”

“Not until you own up to it,” Gaby snaps. “What the hell went wrong, Solo?”

Napoleon feels something snap. “I don’t know!” he shouts at Gaby, spinning on his heel to face her. “I don’t fucking know, okay? We were arguing and then it…it just got out of hand and before I knew we were shouting at each other and trying to tear each other down and hurt each other, and god Gaby, I don’t fucking know how it happened!”

It started the same way most arguments do, with a disagreement that seems so small now when looking back on it. Illya was talking about getting back to fitness so he can go back to being a field agent, and Napoleon, quietly worrying about what would happen when Illya did go back to missions, said some throwaway comment about Illya not needing to get back anytime soon. And then all of the tensions and aggravations that had built up over the past couple of weeks had finally spilt over. It all had gone wrong from there.

Gaby is silent, and Napoleon runs his hand over his face. “I don’t know, Gaby,” he mutters. “I was standing there and shouting, and Illya was shouting back, and I just…” He shakes his head. “I messed up,” he admits, turning away. He isn’t able to look her in the eye. “We started arguing over him going back to work as a field agent as soon as possible, and then it rolled over to Sanders and how I want to go after him and how Illya doesn’t want me to, and neither of us backed down, so then it just got worse and worse, and all through it I was standing there thinking that I love him, and dammit I’ll never deserve him!”

Gaby’s expression softens slightly. “Oh, Napoleon,” she murmurs, and Napoleon squeezes his eyes shut as she walks over and grasps his hand. “Darling. You’re a complete idiot.”

Napoleon laughs brokenly. “Don’t sugarcoat it,” he mutters.

“Oh, but you are,” Gaby says. She takes his hand and tugs him over to the sofa, and pushes him to sit down. She perches opposite him on the edge of the coffee table, and arches a brow. Napoleon suddenly feels tired, and just looks blankly at her.

Gaby purses her lips. “Look,” she says. “You’ve hurt Illya, and you need to fix that. And whilst he’s hurt you too, I think the worst you’ve done to yourself.” She takes both of his hands, and briefly sighs. “You love him,” she says. “That’s not going to change anytime soon, is it?”

Napoleon pauses. “I don’t know,” he hedges. “Things can change, and I don’t even know how Illya feels. I doubt he likes me in that way, and-”

Gaby cuts him off. “Solo,” she says sternly. “Just answer yes or no. Could you stop loving Illya?”

“No,” Napoleon says, after a long pause. “No, I don’t think I could. He’s it for me, he’s all there is.”

Gaby nods. “Okay,” she says. “Next question. Do you regret what you said to Illya?”

“Of course I do,” Napoleon says instantly. “I was angry, and was worried about him, and it all got away from me. I don’t want to hurt him, I just…” He sighs. “It all just slipped out, and I regret every word of it.”

“Good,” Gaby says firmly. “Now what’s this nonsense about you not deserving Illya?”

Napoleon shakes his head. “Heat of the moment,” is all he says, because he doesn’t want to get into this argument. Gaby scoffs.

“You’re an idiot, if you think that’s the case,” she says. “But I can’t just tell you that, you have to work that one out on your own. For what it’s worth, I think you’re a pretty good person.”

Napoleon smiles bitterly. “Because that makes everything better.”

Gaby frowns, and cups his cheek. “Oh, you idiot,” she says fondly. “You stubborn fool. You and Illya really are made for each other.” She sighs, and then pulls back. Napoleon watches as she goes from his friend to his colleague and probably future boss. “I’m going to go and check on Illya now,” she says. “You are going to not do anything stupid like drink too much and then call him tonight. I will talk to Illya, and then tomorrow you will come into work and apologise to him wholeheartedly.”

Napoleon just nods, and Gaby looks satisfied. “By the way,” she says as she gets to her feet and gets Illya’s bag. “I think you should talk to him, properly for once. Tell him how you feel, because it cannot continue like this forever. It’s your choice, and I won’t say anything to him, but I honestly think you should at least talk to him about whatever this is between you.”

Napoleon looks up at her. “And what if he hates me for it?” he asks, and he hates how his voice is suddenly small and the scotch loosens his tongue. Gaby gives him a familiar look, fondness and exasperation mixed together.

“He won’t,” she says firmly. “He cares for you, Solo, more than you might realise. If your positions were reversed, if you were the one injured, do you think Illya would have done anything different? Do you think he wouldn’t have spent every moment he could sat by your bed?” Napoleon’s silence is enough, and she nods. “Think about that, tonight,” she says. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

She shuts the door behind her, and Napoleon sags back onto the couch. He thinks about what Gaby just said, and then shakes his head. “I need another scotch if I’m going to do this,” he murmurs, and he grabs the decanter.

0-o-0-o-0

When Gaby walks through the door of his apartment, Illya is staring at a bottle of vodka. She glares, stalks over and snatches it away from him. “Are you a complete idiot?” she snaps. “Vodka? On your pain medication?”

“It’s not been opened,” Illya points out, even though he eyes it as Gaby puts it on the kitchen table. “I’m not stupid.”

“Really?” Gaby asks. “Because this whole day is stacking up evidence against you.”

Illya glares at her and gets to his feet with a wince. “I didn’t do this,” he says. “I didn’t start all this.”

“No, but you didn’t help,” Gaby snaps. “You let it get away from you, and now you’re hurt and Solo is hurt, and it’s all one big fucking mess.”

“Oh, he’s hurt as well?” Illya asks bitterly. “I doubt that.”

“Don’t make me slap you as well,” Gaby says to him, shoving at him. Illya steps back almost on reflex. Ever since Rome, when Gaby tackled him into a coffee table, he’s been terrified of losing his temper with her and hurting her. Gaby glares up at him, with her fierce brown eyes and her hands on her hips, and Illya finds his anger draining, and guilt welling up instead.

“You know that’s not true,” Gaby scolds. “You know that Solo is hurt by this, and don’t you dare pretend like you don’t! _Verdammt,_ Illya, you know how many people think Solo is nothing but a thief with no morals and who doesn’t care about anybody. You of all people should know that isn’t true!”

Illya stares at her. “I didn’t say that,” he gets out eventually. “But…I trusted him.” That, more than anything, was what had made Illya turn around and walk out the door, ignoring the way his hands were trembling and how his traitorous heart was all but shouting at him to turn around and go back inside. He’d trusted Napoleon with his secrets, with his past, and Napoleon had thrown it in his face.

Gaby’s expression softens slightly. “I know you did,” she says, and she takes both of Illya’s hands. Her hands are dwarfed by his, and rough and pitted compared to hers. She tugs on them slightly, pulling Illya towards her until she has to look up at him. She doesn’t look intimidated.

“I know,” she says again. “And I know it hurts, but Illya…” She sighs softly. “You did the same to him.”

Illya pulls back from her. “What are you talking about?”

Gaby grabs his hands again and frowns at him, tugging him towards her. He can’t help but go. “He trusted you,” she says. “And you used it to hurt him. I’m not saying he isn’t to blame, because he definitely is, but you are as well.”

Illya stutters to a stop, and just stares at her. He hadn’t thought of that. “You’ve talked to him.”

“Of course,” Gaby says. “I shouted at him quite a lot, actually.” She studies Illya, and then gives him an exasperated look. “He didn’t seem like he holds any of it against you,” she says. “Which I don’t think he really should, because all this is mostly his fault. He’s mostly angry at himself, and upset.”

Illya blinks, and doesn’t know what to say. “Look,” Gaby says, pulling him over to the couch and pushing him to sit down. Illya’s legs fold beneath him. She drags over a chair from the kitchen table and sits opposite him. “Do you still trust him?”

Illya pauses. “I don’t know. I think so.”

“Do you think Solo would ever tell whatever you’ve told him to anyone else?” Gaby asks. “Would he ever give it to someone so they could bring you down?”

“No,” Illya says immediately. Gaby nods.

“Would you ever do the same to him?” she asks next, and Illya glares at her.

“Of course not,” he says, and his hands begin to tremble. He wraps one hand around his father’s watch on his other wrist to try and still them. He thinks that he’d never give Napoleon up, not even if his own life was forfeit. He thinks that he’d rather leave Napoleon and never see him again than betray him. He thinks he loves him too much to ever do that to him.

Loyalty is a precious and rare commodity amongst their kind, and he knows loyalty is only the surface to what he feels. He wonders if Napoleon will ever feel the same.

Gaby sighs, and squeezes Illya’s hands. “Look, there’s no way to be subtle about this,” she says, and Illya eyes her warily. “I’m just going to ask, but please don’t overreact.” She studies Illya. “Do you love him?”

Illya is moving before he even really thinks about it. He dives for the gun hidden beneath the couch, and scrambles to put the couch between him and Gaby. He can feel his heart racing, but his hand is steady as he aims at Gaby. “You can’t tell anyone,” he chokes out. “I’m dead if the KGB finds out, they’ll kill me without a second thought. Nobody can know.”

Gaby holds up her hands. “It’s okay,” she says softly. “Illya, it’s okay. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t want me to, but nobody at UNCLE cares. I don’t care.” She gets up slowly from the coffee table and steps round the couch, pulling the gun from Illya’s grip. As soon as he lets go his hands start shaking. Gaby sets the gun down, putting the safety on, and then pulls him into a tight hug.

“I don’t care,” she says as Illya hesitantly wraps his arms around her. “I really don’t. And you know Napoleon wouldn’t care either. You’re still you, and that’s enough.” She holds onto him for a long moment, and Illya gradually lets himself relax. He’s safe enough with Gaby knowing, and some part of him is relieved that she does.

“That was definitely an overreaction, but I’ll take it as a yes,” Gaby says eventually, and she pulls back enough to look up at Illya. “How long have you been pining?” Illya just looks away, and she huffs. “You’re being stupid. You know Solo likes men as well as women, and you don’t seem to have an issue with that.”

“I don’t,” Illya says quickly. After all, it would be quite hypocritical.

There have only ever been a few men he’s been attracted to, let alone fallen in love with, but Napoleon outshines them all. In Russia, in the spetsnaz and then the KGB, he’d had to be so careful, to the point that there was barely any worth in seeking any relationship at all. He’d only had one proper relationship with another man, and that was in the midst of spetsnaz training when they were out in the wilds for months and there was nobody watching.

But Napoleon, with his quick tongue and even quicker fingers and his love of stealing art from people who keep it hidden because he thinks art deserves to be seen by everyone, Napoleon has embedded himself, and is not like anyone Illya has ever met before.

Gaby is studying him with her fierce brown eyes, and briefly Illya thinks it would have been easier to love her. Napoleon, for all that Illya loves him, is not easy, but then Illya doesn’t think he’d love him if he were.

“I’ll tell you what I told Solo,” she says eventually. “Firstly, you’re an idiot. Secondly, I think you should tell him how you feel, because this can’t go on forever. Thirdly, I am taking that bottle of vodka with me when I leave, and you are not to do anything stupid like get drunk and call him. Fourthly,” and Illya rolls his eyes until she fixes him with a sharp look, “you are going to go into the office tomorrow and you are not going to punch Solo in the face, you’re going to sit down and talk to him.”

Gaby’s expression softens as Illya glares at her. “Solo regrets everything he said,” she says. “And I think he just wants to apologise for it all. I know you’re hurting, and frustrated with recovering slowly, and I know he hurt you, but he really is sorry. That doesn’t excuse what he said, but he does regret it and that counts for something.”

She gets to her feet, pressing a kiss to Illya’s cheek. “You love him,” she says. “And I don’t think that’s going to change anytime soon.” Illya shakes his head, and for some reason Gaby looks pleased. “He spent every moment he could by your bedside, Illya. That has to mean something.”

There’s a brief flare of hope somewhere deep within him, and Illya is terrified to let it grow. Gaby picks up the vodka bottle and puts it in her bag, and then pauses. She pulls out a little square box, and hands it to Illya. “Don’t do anything with this until you’ve talked to Solo first, and properly,” she says. “But once you know…where you stand with him, you might want to listen to this. Medical monitors and records more than you’d think, and what Solo had to say then will clear up a lot.”

Illya takes the box, and opens it to see a cassette. The date written on it is the day after the incident, when he was still unconscious. “What is this?” he asks, taking it out and turning it over, looking for any more information.

Gaby smiles, and it’s tinged with sadness. “Let Solo know it’s the only copy, when you listen to it,” she just says. “I only heard enough of it to know that it’s something you should hear, and that he should have.”

Illya pockets it with a nod. He doesn’t intend to listen to it without Napoleon knowing about it first, even though the cassette burns a hole in his pocket. He won’t take any of Napoleon’s secrets without Napoleon’s knowledge or permission. Gaby smiles, and shuts the door behind her as she leaves.

Illya sits there, staring at nothing, for longer than he’d like to admit. Eventually he rouses himself and, with a distinct lack of vodka, makes himself tea instead. He only drinks half of it before he sets it aside and leaves it, forgotten, to go cold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I'm sorry.
> 
> Well, not really- I did write this, after all.
> 
> They are spies, and damaged people- their relationship is not going to be easy. But they will get there, in the end.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few more bumps in the road still to come, I'm afraid.

Napoleon is on his fourth scotch, or quite possibly his fifth, when he finally works up the courage to think about what Gaby told him.

He knows he loves Illya, he’s known for months now, but now there’s the bitter taste of guilt in his mouth as he thinks about all the times he could have done something, all those long nights in safehouses around the world where they sat up and talked, all those times they dragged each other from the fires. All the time they had over these past few weeks, just the two of them in this apartment with nothing but maybe a chessboard and Napoleon’s own damn cowardice between them.

He watched Illya nearly die, knelt next to him in amongst the rubble, and still he has done nothing.

He knows he had decent excuses for the first couple of weeks. Napoleon knows that people will say almost anything when they’re dying. He’s seen it before. And it is unlikely Illya remembers anything of what he said, both in the rubble on that street and afterwards, in Medical. Napoleon won’t hold that against him, won’t leverage the fear that comes with death to get Illya for himself. And he couldn’t have done anything in the first week or two after Illya woke up, because Illya definitely wasn’t quite in his right mind, given the amount of pain he was in and the opioids he was on.

But now, with five scotches in him, Napoleon can admit to himself he was just scared and too cowardly to do anything. He thought he’d rather keep what they have now than risk losing it all.

He was wrong. He loves Illya, and he doesn’t know what to do.

He’s terrified that he isn’t good enough for him, that even if Illya does return his feelings it will all implode anyway because he isn’t good enough, he’s just an art thief who ran away once the war was over because to go back home and become nothing again was too much to bear.

He’s terrified that he will somehow fuck it all up, that somewhere down the relationship, if there even is one, he’ll get scared and it will go wrong and Illya will hate him for it. He doesn’t know what he could do if Illya really hated him.

He’s terrified that he’ll lose him, and that he won’t be able to stand the loss.

Napoleon stares at his scotch, and then throws back the drink in one go. It does nothing to lessen the churn of worry and guilt and regret that’s sitting heavy in his chest. He remembers what he’d told Illya when he was dying in the street, that this time he’d be braver. He remembers how he promised it at Illya’s bedside, like a coward when Illya was unconscious and couldn’t hear him. He nearly laughs at it. He supposes he really is the liar everyone believes him to be.

He’s not an honest person. He’s not even a very good person. He gave that up long before ever joining the game, chasing the thrill and the danger of being a thief and running away from everything he’d left behind. He knows that Illya isn’t what most people would classify as a good person either, but then they’ve never seen him sneaking pastries out of the box when he thinks nobody is looking, or the look in his eyes when they don’t save everyone. Napoleon has seen it all, has seen the blood and the rage that has been carved into him since he was a child and he still can’t help but love him, because he carries it all and he still doesn’t back down from the fight.

Napoleon remembers all the times he’s followed Illya into the fight, because to turn away would be unthinkable, and he wonders if he’s less of a coward when Illya is there.

He remembers kneeling on the street, dust and rubble under his knees and Illya’s hand in his. He doesn’t think he’s ever really felt fear like that, but then he doesn’t think he’s ever really loved like this before. He thinks he’ll remember the way his name sounds on Illya’s lips as he loses consciousness for years.

He remembers the aching regret that found him in those hours afterwards, the way it clawed at his throat and lodged in his chest, and how he wanted to scream it out but didn’t know how. _Had we but world enough and time_ , he thinks suddenly, and it sticks in his throat, making him choke on the words. He understands it now, he knows how much it hurts to wish for more, how there’s this aching, terrible pull at an empty place inside his chest for something he might not ever be able to have.

He knows it would only be a thousand times worse if Illya had died.

Napoleon sits on his couch, and he remembers.

0-o-0-o-0

The tea has long since gone cold when Illya throws it down the sink. He stays there for a moment, bracing himself against the counter to take some weight off his leg, and watches the final drops of tea disappear down the drain. Very carefully, he puts the mug down on the side and resists the urge to shatter it against the wall.

He remembers when he first realised he loved Napoleon. They were in Vienna, a few months ago, and had just wrapped up a case involving arms dealers and the black markets that had left Napoleon looking twitchy with the amount of stolen art that had been damaged when forgotten in a warehouse. For one of their missions it had been wrapped up fairly easily, with Illya sustaining the only injury where a bullet clipped his upper arm. Napoleon had fussed over the wound, but it had barely needed stitches.

Waverly, deciding to give them a rest, gave them a whole day off in Vienna. He and Napoleon both spent the morning meeting separate contacts and shoring up what relations they had in the city, but in the afternoon Napoleon insisted on dragging him to the Kunsthistorisches Museum in the city centre. Truthfully, Illya hadn’t needed much convincing, not with the way that Napoleon had grinned as they’d stepped into the atrium of the museum and looked up at the ceiling, or with how he’d grab Illya’s arm to pull him over to look at another painting.

He can’t even remember half of the art that they saw. What he remembers is following Napoleon around and listening to every word he said, trying to understand what it was that made Napoleon so enraptured when he saw a Vermeer at the end of the hall and practically dragged Illya over to it, explaining in a rush of words just why this painting was so important.

What he remembers is looking at Napoleon more than he looked at the paintings, wondering how it was that compared to all the priceless pieces of art around them, it was Napoleon who took his breath away.

What he remembers is thinking: _Oh. I suppose this is it, then._

Sometimes, in the middle of the night when the shadows bleed from the walls of his apartment and everything carved into him is near the surface, he wonders if this is just to be his life, an endless series of things being taken from him ever since men broke down the door to his house and his father disappeared. _One more,_ he thinks. _One more thing that could be ripped away at any moment_.

He doesn’t know whether he can take losing something else, especially when it is as important as this.

Napoleon is infuriating in every way imaginable, the way he gets under Illya’s skin and somehow makes a home there, curling around his heart with his quick wit and quicker fingers, and fierce, genuine care over those he wants to protect. But Illya has watched him drag himself back after a mission, put on a new suit, fix his cufflinks and head out again because there’s another fight to be had. Sometimes, Illya thinks it’s the only thing that makes him step out the door again, the knowledge that he’s following Napoleon out there.

Sometimes, he thinks this life, the terrible things they do, they’re only redeemed because he gets to have Napoleon by his side.

He looks up, and sees the framed photo on his mantelpiece.

It’s Napoleon and himself, on a balcony in Istanbul. He remembers the sting of the road rash down his side, from being thrown out of a car as it was speeding down the road. He remembers the bruise down one side of Napoleon’s face, though it can’t be seen in the photo. He thinks it was from a wooden beam, but it was the middle of a firefight and he only realised when Napoleon dropped to the floor. The man standing over him had fallen down a second later, and Illya hadn’t even thought about pulling the trigger.

In the photo, Napoleon had just been complaining about losing another suit, and he’d laughed at him. Gaby had taken the photo just before Napoleon had complained again, and there’s a wry smirk on his own lips as he waits for the inevitable protests.

Looking at that photo, he wonders if he loved Napoleon from that moment, or even before. He wonders if it all started when Napoleon had reached for a watch instead of a gun.

He tries to remember what happened on that street, in amongst the rubble and with Napoleon kneeling next to him. He has vague memories of scrabbling for control, trying to pull away from the agony and focus on Napoleon.

He thinks that might be what he’s scared of. Napoleon gets under his skin and wrests control away from him, and it goes against everything Illya has been taught. He wishes he could be braver.

He recalls saying that on the street, and vaguely remembers the way Napoleon’s face crumpled as he said it. He doesn’t know how Napoleon answered, but then he doesn’t know a lot that happened that night.

He mostly remembers knowing that he was dying, and how a selfish part of him was glad to have Napoleon with him at the end.

He can vaguely recall the last few moments before losing consciousness, in that he remembers Napoleon. Always, it’s Napoleon. He was dying, and Napoleon was the last thing he thought of. He woke up, and Napoleon was there.

He doesn’t think that is something he should ever let go of, for one moment.

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon stares at the chessboard on his coffee table, and remembers the terrible empty ache of regret. He knows that he might never deserve Illya, but he thinks that he would rather try, than have to live with the regret. He doesn’t know how he could live with that emptiness.

Illya stares at the photo on his mantelpiece, and remembers that the last thought he had as he lay dying was Napoleon. He knows that he’s terrified of losing the last shreds of control he has clung to, but he thinks Napoleon might be worth it. He doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life wishing he’d been braver.

They can’t let this become just another regret. They already have so many.

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon sleeps fitfully, and is late into work. By the time he gets in Illya is already in Medical, and Napoleon goes straight to his office. He tries to do some work, but gets side-tracked by deciding what he’s going to say to Illya when he sees him. He’s barely gotten through one file when Gaby pushes his door open and walks in without knocking.

“You’re staring at your coffee like it’s going to start talking and provide you with all the answers you need,” she says, perching on the edge of his desk.

“Your point?” Napoleon asks, glancing up at her.

“I’m just saying, it’s a lot of pressure on the coffee,” Gaby says, and then cracks a grin at her joke. “You’re looking mildly more put together than last night. Do anything stupid?”

“If what you’re asking is whether I drank too much and tried to call Peril, then no,” Napoleon says. “I’m not that stupid.”

Gaby shrugs, and swings her legs against the desk. “So what were you thinking about?” she asks.

“What to say to Peril when I see him,” Napoleon confesses. Gaby gives him a look.

“I’d start with some sort of apology,” she says dryly. “That might help.” Napoleon swats at her with a file, and she grabs it out of his hands. “Apologise unreservedly,” she says. “And try to explain what I’m sure you spent most of last night thinking about.” She smiles slightly. “He’ll listen to you.”

“I hope so,” Napoleon mutters. Gaby looks at him with that familiar mix of fondness and exasperation, and presses a kiss to his cheek. Once she leaves, Napoleon tries to get back to work, but he’s constantly distracted by imagining how today could end.

The hours either drag past or disappear quicker than his coffee, depending on whether he’s actually doing work or thinking about the rest of the day. Eventually the door is pushed open, and Illya limps in, leaning on a cane. He stops short when he sees Napoleon.

“I’m sorry,” is the first thing Napoleon blurts out. He gets to his feet, his chair scraping against the floor. Illya stares at him, and says nothing.

“I’m sorry,” he repeats, the words rushing out for fear that Illya will leave before he’s able to say it. “For what I said last night. I’m the one who was meant to be helping you, and I didn’t. I should have been better.”

Illya stares at him for a long moment, and then shuts the door behind him. “I know it’s been…difficult,” he says slowly, limping across to lean on his own desk. “I know I’m not easy, especially with all this.” He taps the cane against his leg with a wry curl to his lips.

“Yes, but I should have handled it better,” Napoleon says. “And I’m sorry for not doing that. I’m sorry for betraying you.”

At that, Illya huffs a soft laugh. “Betrayal is strong word, Cowboy,” he says wryly. Napoleon didn’t know how much he wanted to hear that nickname until Illya says it, and he relaxes slightly.

“I mean it, though,” he says, sitting back in his chair. “Gaby shouted some choice truths at me last night, and she was right. You trusted me with your past, with your secrets, and last night I threw it back in your face. As you are fond of saying, we are spies, and that makes my actions last night even worse.”

Illya just looks at him questioningly and Napoleon sighs, trying to work out how to say it without sounding like a complete idiot. “Trust is a commodity amongst us,” he says eventually. “It was not too common in the CIA, and probably neither in the KGB. I abused that trust, and for that I’m sorry.”

Illya runs a hand over his face. “If that is case, then I must apologise too,” he says.

Napoleon blinks. “What?”

“I did the same to you,” Illya says, and he sounds serious. “You trusted me, and I threw it in your face, as you say.” He makes a face. “That’s a stupid phrase. In Russia we don’t need so many…adjectives?”

“Metaphors,” Napoleon offers, and he can’t help but grin. Illya gives him a look, but the corners of his lips are curling.

“Anyway,” Illya says. “I accept your apology, and I’m sorry. I was angry and in pain, and I didn’t control temper like I should have.”

“Neither did I,” Napoleon says. “But I accept the apology that I’m not quite sure I deserve.” He huffs a laugh. “I was half wondering if Gaby was going to lock us in this room until we sorted this out. Did she call you a complete idiot as well?”

“More or less,” Illya says wryly. “She took my vodka from me.”

Napoleon gasps in mock outrage. “Well Peril, that simply won’t do,” he says, and Illya rolls his eyes. “It’s not the Russian way, to steal a man’s vodka. Even if you shouldn’t be drinking on your medication.”

Illya throws his hands in the air. “It was unopened,” he mutters. “And proper vodka. It took me three days to track down in New York. Knowing Gaby, she’s probably opened it already.”

“Well…” Napoleon hesitates. “I have another bottle back at my penthouse, if you’d like. I was actually going to ask if you wanted to come over after work. Gaby didn’t pick up everything of yours, and, well, there’s something I want to talk to you about.”

There, he’d asked it. Illya nods, and then looks uncertain. “There’s actually something I wanted to talk to you about as well,” he says hesitantly.

Napoleon arches a brow. “Nothing bad, I hope?”

Illya’s gaze doesn’t quite meet his as he shakes his head. “Nothing bad,” he echoes in reply. “It can wait until tonight, though.”

Napoleon relaxes slightly. If it can wait, then it’s not vitally important, and hopefully it won’t take too long. He fears that if it does, he’ll lose his courage, and won’t tell Illya how he feels. Of course, that’s the whole point of asking Illya to come round to his apartment tonight.

He gets to his feet. “Late lunch?” he asks. “If you’ve come straight from Medical you must be starving.” Illya just nods, getting to his feet with a wince. They’re about to head out when there’s a buzz on the intercom. Napoleon answers it, and a tinny voice of a secretary tells them Waverly wants to see them.

“Duty calls, I suppose,” Napoleon says with a sigh. “I don’t think it will take too long, given neither of us are cleared for active missions. We’ll go down and get lunch afterwards.” He grabs the door for Illya, and the two of them head for Waverly’s office.

Napoleon glances over his shoulder at Illya as he knocks on Waverly’s office door and pushes it open at the muffled command to enter. “There’s a new bistro down the block,” he says to Illya as he enters. “We could go there and-”

He trails off when he sees Illya’s eyes widen as the door opens and suddenly pull himself up to stand in a semblance of attention. “ _Tovarishch podpolkovnik,_ ”he says sharply. Napoleon turns, and he feels his breath stutter in his throat when he sees Oleg sat in the chair in front of Waverly’s desk. He looks at Waverly for some explanation, but his boss says nothing.

Oleg gets to his feet. “ _Tovarishch_ Kuryakin,” he says in reply. “Pack a bag. You’re coming back to Russia.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I said there would be a few more bumps in the road, I wasn't kidding. I know, I'm awful. I can't help myself sometimes.
> 
> I've just gone back to uni, so the rate I've been uploading chapters might slow down a bit, but I am still working on other stories! The Tour AU is coming along- I'm probably about halfway through- and I also have an idea for an AU where Napoleon, retired from UNCLE/CIA, is a professor of History of Art in London, and Illya is the husband (still a spy) which all of Napoleon's students are far too curious about. Gaby, of course, is his boss and generally amazing and constantly saving the world. Oh, and there's a coffee shop AU floating around in my head as well.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm aware I made a few people a little mad with that last cliffhanger (I think 'you fuck' is the best compliment I've ever gotten for my writing) so here is another chapter, and the answer to the suspense!
> 
> I've only just finished my first week at uni and second year is already kicking my arse- chemistry is a very hard subject, kids, don't take it unless you really want to! Labs alone are awful, because sometimes science decides it is going to make you its bitch for the day and everything goes horribly wrong. So writing has slowed down, as a result- I'm still chipping away at it all, but time is not something I have much of at the moment!

Illya can feel his heart hammering in his chest, and he thinks: _one more thing to be ripped away._ Napoleon is stunned into silence, which Illya doesn’t even have time to appreciate.

He needs to get out of the room before he breaks something, so he salutes. “Permission to return to my apartment and pack a bag,” he says, forcing his voice to remain neutral and even in front of his commander. He thinks with every beat of his heart that Oleg can see through his thin disguise that he’s struggling to hold together as it rips in his hands, but Oleg doesn’t look suspicious.

Oleg waves a hand. “Yes, yes off you go,” he says, sounding bored. “Come back here when you’re done.” Illya nods, and grabs Napoleon’s arm to drag him out the room. He resists slightly, staring at Waverly until the door shuts in his face and Illya hauls him into the corridor.

His leg is forgotten as he stalks back to his office, hands trembling even as he clenches his fists and tries to hide it. He can feel the maddening anger slowly rising in his throat, and he tries to breathe through it but it’s too much, he’s lost too much, and regret anchors itself into his bones to fill in what the KGB carved out.

It takes Napoleon a few moments to catch up, and then he’s running to draw near to Illya. “Waverly can’t let this happen,” he says frantically. “He can’t let Oleg take you away, he can’t.”

“Waverly has no choice, Cowboy,” Illya says, and even his own words sound strange and foreign to his ears. He reaches their office and slams the door open, Napoleon stumbling in behind him.

For a moment he just stands there and stares at the life he’d carved out for himself here, the lockpick Napoleon had given him in Madrid as a joke, Napoleon’s copy of the photo on his desk. There’s an empty glass sitting on his desk and he picks it up, turning it over in his hands.

Whatever Napoleon tries to say is drowned out by the sound of the glass shattering as it hits the wall. The case files are next to go, paper spilling out across the floor and it’s not enough, so he tears the now empty folders apart. He isn’t even thinking, he can’t think about the regret and the guilt and the constant pounding of his heart as he just hears in his own head: _I wish we could have had more._

He reaches for the lamp on the desk, ripping it from the socket at the wall. As he spins to throw it he turns on his injured leg, and something twists. A shout of pain slips through his lips as he drops the lamp and his leg buckles, and he begins to slip towards the floor.

Suddenly, Napoleon is there. He takes his weight and pulls him upright, leaning him against his desk. “Illya,” he says urgently, and at the sound of his name the fog begins to clear from Illya’s mind. “Illya, listen to me.”

Illya blinks, and focuses on Napoleon. He doesn’t listen to what he is saying. He’s trying to memorise the lines of Napoleon’s face.

Napoleon grabs his shoulder, shaking him. “Are you even listening to me?” he asks. “Illya, listen. Listen to me.” His hand moves to cup the back of Illya’s neck, pulling him down. “Illya, you have to run.”

“Going back is a death sentence,” Napoleon says desperately. “You can’t go back, you can’t, they’ll kill you one way or another. Illya, you have to run. Get out of the country, get to a safehouse somewhere. I’ll make Waverly keep you from the KGB, I’ll make sure you stay here, but you have to run. If they get you they’re never going to let you go.”

Napoleon is looking at him with desperation in his eyes, and Illya can’t help himself. He reaches out and his hand cups Napoleon’s cheek.

“Come with me,” he says softly.

Napoleon blinks. “What?”

“Come with me,” Illya repeats. “We run together.” Napoleon hesitates, and it breaks Illya’s heart. “You told me you wouldn’t run unless I came,” he says, remembering those words Napoleon had murmured to him as he lay in a hospital bed. “I’m asking the same. We stand a better chance together than apart, and I’m not losing you. Come with me.”

Napoleon stares up at Illya. “Yes,” he breathes. “Yes, we’ll run together.”

Those words spur them into action, and they both pull away from each other. Illya takes two briefcases out of the closet, already packed in case they needed to head out on a mission quickly. “Are we bugged?” he asks Napoleon, who is rifling through a false compartment in the bottom of a desk drawer for something.

“I checked this morning,” Napoleon says. Illya pulls a device out from under his desk anyway and flicks a switch, and a slight buzzing fills the air. Napoleon recognises it as a general frequency jammer, but it has some extra bits on it that are probably Illya’s invention. They’ll be safe enough to talk.

“I have a safehouse in Europe,” he says, still reluctant to give specific details in the middle of UNCLE. “Nobody knows about it. If we can get there, we’ll be safe for a few weeks at least. We can regroup and plan from there. I have enough resources stocked there to get us anywhere we need to.”

“I can get us out of the country,” Illya says quickly. “There is back door I established when I came here, just in case. They can go as soon as I call.” He shoves a couple of things into his briefcase and slams it shut. “We need to move.”

They’re heading for the door when it suddenly swings open and Gaby pushes her way in, closely followed by Waverly’s secretary. “He didn’t know,” is the first thing she says to them. “Waverly believed the issue with the KGB to be resolved, he didn’t know Oleg was coming. Illya, you have to get out of here.”

“Already on it,” Napoleon says, grabbing his own briefcase. “And don’t try to talk me out of this Gaby, I’m going with him.” Gaby, to her credit, just nods.

Deena steps forwards and presses an envelope into each of their hands. “You have tickets booked on an overnight train to Texas,” she says. “And a conductor at the station is going to be convinced that he saw you getting on the train. A guard at the Mexico border will recognise your pictures.”

Illya opens his envelope to see cash, and a French passport with a new identity, stating that he’d defected from Poland and is now a French citizen. Napoleon has the same, though his passport is American. “We’ll go the other way, then,” Napoleon says with a grateful smile. He grabs a sheaf of papers from the false compartment of his desk drawer and puts them in his briefcase. “Visas for most countries we can think of,” he says to Illya. “Any special permits we might need are in there as well, and I can forge anything else. We’re getting out of here, I promise.”

Illya just nods. He knows how easily promises between spies can be broken, but he also believes Napoleon. “Oleg will have people watching front door,” he says. “If I walk out, they will tail me.” He turns to Deena. “We have back door somewhere. Where is it?”

“Service elevator in the parking level will take you to the subway, if you press the second and fourth button at the same time,” she says promptly.

Illya nods, and scribbles down an address on a piece of paper. “Get to this address by six,” he says to Napoleon. “I’ll meet you there. Better if we leave separately. They won’t think to watch you.”

“Waverly is going to get you out of this, Illya,” Gaby says as he turns to leave. “He’s not going to let you go. You just need to give him a little time.” Illya nods, but privately doubts how much Waverly can do against the KGB. He’d rather run, and stay running for however long he can, if Napoleon is with him.

“Take your communicator,” Gaby says, but Illya shakes his head when Napoleon reaches for it.

“Can be traced,” he says. “We’ll call when we get where we’re going, give number to call in Morse code over the line. Call only if we can come back. If nothing in three weeks, we’ll move on.” He’s already forming plans in his head, contingencies and backup plans and what to do if they are made in Europe. He won’t lose Napoleon over this, he refuses to risk it. He’s beginning to think of ways to make sure Napoleon survives this, no matter the cost to himself. He’s a spy, and they die easily.

He thinks he might not be so scared of that, if it means Napoleon escapes.

He turns to Napoleon. “I’ll see you there, Cowboy,” he says softly.

Napoleon flinches towards him, reaching out for a moment before pulling himself back. “See you soon, Peril,” he says, his voice that same strange softness that tries to hide everything beneath it. Illya steps out of the office before he grabs Napoleon’s hand and never lets go.

0-o-0-o-0

A darker shadow moves within a shadow, and Napoleon is going for his gun before he realises it’s Illya. He breathes a sigh of relief.

“I was worried they’d made you,” he confesses, resisting the urge to drag Illya into an embrace as Illya steps forwards towards him. “Or that you’d picked up a tail.”

Illya just stares at him. “You came,” he says softly, and he sounds like he can’t quite believe it.

“Of course I came,” Napoleon replies immediately. “Better together, right? Now, how are we getting out of here?”

Illya seems to snap back into himself, and he leads Napoleon through a gap in the fence and onto what looks like, in the darkness, a small runway. “Pilot owes me favour,” he says as he runs across the tarmac and towards a warehouse where the lights are on, Napoleon following. “He transports high end cargo into Canada, we can have space on plane.”

“A smuggler, then,” Napoleon says, and a small part of him feels pleased at that. “Excellent. Any art?”

Illya gives him a look, his face half cast into shadow by the lights in what Napoleon can now see is a warehouse converted into a hangar. “You are incorrigible, Cowboy.”

Napoleon just grins. “You wouldn’t have it any other way,” he just says. They head towards the hangar and the small plane sitting inside of it. There are a few people moving around inside, but Illya doesn’t hesitate, and leads them straight in.

Napoleon is only a few steps inside when there’s a gun pointing at his head. He pauses, slowly raising his hands. “Peril, care to explain what’s going on?” he asks Illya, who has a gun pointed at his own head.

Illya looks annoyed. “I called ahead,” he mutters. “But someone,” and at that, he glares around at the men standing around with rifles pointed at them, “forgot to tell the rest of these people.”

“Very reliable friends, Peril,” Napoleon points out. “Sure he can fly a plane?”

“Can I fly a plane?” comes an incredulous voice, and Napoleon blinks as a short man bounces in between the various men with guns. “Red, what have you been telling your friends?”

Napoleon watches, incredulous, as this man dances around them, waving at the men to put down their weapons. “Boys, boys, there’s enough bloodshed in the world without you adding to it,” he says in a sing-song voice and a French accent, sidling up to Illya. Illya looks deeply unimpressed with it all, and looks down at the man.

“You forgot to tell them, didn’t you,” he says accusingly.

“ _Non, non_ , let’s not put blame onto one another,” the man says. He wanders up to Napoleon, having to tilt his head up to look him in the eye, and looks mildly disgusted. “American. You have no class.”

“Guilty as charged,” Napoleon says, putting on one of his most disarming smiles and a perfect French accent. “ _Tu es Français?”_ The man sniffs, and nods.

“ _Je l’aime_ ,” he says, turning to Illya. “For an American, of course.”

Illya just gives him a look. “Cowboy, this is Versailles,” he says. “Versailles, Cowboy. I’m sure you’ll get on brilliantly. Can we leave?”

“Ah, being chased, are we Red?” Versailles asks. He grins. “How fun. Want to narrow the gap and see how it goes?”

Illya cuffs him around the head. “Get us in the air, or I break your sculptures,” he says simply. “Cowboy, let’s get on the plane.” Versailles scoffs, but starts directing men around. Illya nods at Napoleon, and they make their way over to the plane.

“He’s quite mad,” Napoleon mutters to Illya as they climb into the plane. He can’t help but notice the stacked canvases, covered in sheets and strapped to one side of the stripped-out plane, and the various crates. Illya purposefully steers him away from them, and sits down in one of the few seats left in the plane.

“He is,” he agrees, setting his briefcase down at his feet and leaning back in the chair. “But brilliant smuggler and pilot.” He glances at Napoleon, who doesn’t even try to restrain his curiosity, and sighs. “His real name is Arnaud,” he explains. “I met him undercover in France. Was pilot in war, became smuggler. Is best person to get you across a border without anyone knowing.”

“How come he’s here?” Napoleon asks. “Much better pickings across Europe.”

“ _Je sais, je sais_ ,” Versailles says sadly, appearing in the door to the plane. “But what is life without travelling everywhere? Even if America has no class, at least it will make France look better when I go back.” Illya hums in agreement, and gives Napoleon a pointed look.

“I’m the first to admit that America is lacking something compared to France,” Napoleon says, ignoring Illya. “I’ve spent a lot of time in Europe, and France. Were you there during the fifties?” At Versailles’ nod, he smiles slightly, remembering those days. “Did you ever work with the Marseilles group? _Les combattants pour la liberté_ they used to call themselves, the pretentious Frenchmen that they were.”

“ _Oui_ , _naturellement,_ ” Versailles says as he settles into the pilot’s seat. Another few men board the plane, one taking the seat next to Versailles and the others moving to the back of the plane amongst the cargo. “Jacques Demas and his band, _non_? You know them?”

Napoleon huffs. “Know them? I taught Jacques how to crack safes. Worked with them after the war for a bit.” Versailles looks surprised at that, and then frowns. He twists in his seat to look at Napoleon even as the plane starts up and begins to move.

“Jacques mentioned the man who taught him,” he says. “That means you must be the one who took the Renoir.”

“Yes, that was me,” Napoleon says with a fond smile. He’d stolen it in the middle of the day, when the museum was open. It is one of his fonder memories, that heist, and the painting has sentimental value for that reason. “Still have it, I think.”

Versailles whistles slowly. “ _Magnifique,_ ” he says appreciatively. “They still talk about that one in our circles. Honoured to meet the man who pulled it off.”

Napoleon nods his thanks. “If only we’d met, all those years ago,” he muses. “We’d have been unstoppable.”

Illya groans. “Cowboy,” he mutters, tipping his head back against the headrest. “Enough.”

Napoleon glances at him, and picks out the extra lines around Illya’s face, the way he’s sitting to favour his healing leg and his ribs. “When was the last time you took any painkillers?” he asks softly. Versailles, with a slight nod to himself and a knowing look at Napoleon, turns back to piloting the plane. They are on the runway now, the lights running off into the distance.

“Don’t know,” Illya mutters. He shifts slightly, and winces. Napoleon watches as his eyes flit around the plane, and suddenly realises he might have, in the past few minutes, not been treating the situation seriously enough. It’s not quite his life on the line, after all.

“Luckily for you,” he says. “I went back to my apartment before coming here.” He opens up his briefcase and pulls out a bottle of pills. “Thought you might need these.”

Illya takes them with a grateful look. “Thanks, Cowboy,” he mutters, throwing back a few of them. Napoleon studies him, and worry bubbles up in his throat.

“Not regretting it, are you?” he asks, trying his best to put on a light voice. Given the look Illya levels him with, he isn’t very successful.

“Plane is taking off,” Illya murmurs. “Little late for regrets.” Napoleon arches a brow, not convinced, and Illya sighs. “You were right,” he says. “KGB would be death sentence. Running was only option.”

He’s dropping his articles, Napoleon notices, and slurring his words every so slightly. “Doesn’t mean you can’t regret it,” he says quietly. “Even if this was the only option that didn’t end with you dying.”

Illya shakes his head. “Don’t regret it, Cowboy,” he murmurs, and he looks over at him. “You having second thoughts?”

“Never,” Napoleon says instantly. “We’ll get you out of this, Peril. Don’t worry about it.” Illya hums, and his eyes flicker shut. “Go to sleep,” Napoleon says softly. “I’ll wake you up before we land.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the suspense has somewhat been put aside- it's not the point of the story, Oleg is more a catalyst to get Napoleon and Illya in the right situation for them to come together. Sometimes being a spy, even just doing the right thing, means sitting back and letting others handle it.
> 
> There was actually a Renoir that went missing in the fifties- it turned up again in the past few years or so, but Napoleon could have reasonably taken it. It comes back up later on.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've had a shit few days recently- two good friends of mine were in a bad car crash over the weekend, so it's all been a bit up and down. They're both going to be okay, thank god, but they were lucky, and it's terrifying not being able to do anything at all to help, especially when I'm away at uni. Yesterday was tough, being stuck in labs all day and not being able to do anything but think about whether they were going to be okay, and I did cry in front of a professor, but he was very nice about it, so I think it's okay.
> 
> But publishing a new chapter always makes me feel better- seeing all of your responses to my writing is a wonderful thing, it really is, and I want to take the opportunity to say that I love all of you, you're amazing.

Canada is cold, in the beginnings of autumn, and Napoleon finds himself shivering slightly as he walks across the tarmac. He looks down in distaste at the boiler suit he’s wearing. Next to him Illya rolls his eyes, and leans on the crate on the trolley he’s pushing. “Leave it, will you?” he asks. “You only have to wear it for a few minutes.”

“It’s like someone purposefully tried to come up with the most unflattering outfit in existence,” Napoleon says mournfully. He sighs, and starts pushing his own trolley forwards from the plane. He has to admit, it’s a good disguise for getting into the airport. Nobody looks at deliverymen.

They’d thanked Versailles before leaving the plane. The Frenchman had just grinned, bouncing on the balls of his feet, and had declared that Illya owed him a bottle of port. Napoleon decided then that he rather liked the smuggler, and it really was a pity they’d never worked together before.

Illya glances around, uncomfortable. “We ditch these and go in the front door of the airport,” he murmurs. “We have enough cash for flights. Where are we going?”

“Geneva,” Napoleon says. “The safehouse is near the lake.” It makes sense: they’re in Quebec, the part of Canada with the closest ties to France, and Geneva’s airport is on the Swiss-French border, so it’ll be easy enough to get through immigration.

“I have Canadian and Swiss visas,” he adds. “You probably won’t need a Swiss one with your French passport, but you might have to play up the poor defected victim act slightly.” He knows Illya hates doing it, is still loyal to some part of his country, but he can’t exactly fly into Europe with a Russian passport.

Illya huffs. “I do know how to get into a country, Cowboy,” he mutters. He pushes his trolley of cargo towards one of Versailles’ other men. “Let’s get rid of these and get into the airport,” he says. “The quicker out of the country, the better.”

They split up as soon as they get through the airport, two travellers who just happened to walk through the door at the same time. Illya tries not to watch as Napoleon wanders over to a check in desk and flirts lightly with the stewardess as he buys a ticket. Even though he knows Napoleon is only doing it to make the stewardess like him and be less likely to say anything to any authorities that come sniffing around, even though he can see Napoleon isn’t really paying any attention to her, he still feels a brief spike of jealousy.

He shakes it off. This is not the time to become jealous, not when they’re on the run. He heads for another check in desk. He gets a suspicious look with his obviously Slavic appearance, but as soon as the stewardess looks at his passport it turns sympathetic and pitying. He hates it, hates having to pretend like he’s a victim of his real country when deep down he knows he’ll always love Russia, but it gets him a ticket.

The ticket is actually to Paris, the story a French tourist heading back from visiting family in Canada. Illya wanders over to that gate and stays there for a few minutes, picking up an abandoned newspaper and flicking through it. He can’t help but look up every time someone in a nice suit walks past, hoping it to be Napoleon.

Illya scoffs at himself. He can last an hour or two without Napoleon by his side. He spent most of his life without him, after all.

Eventually he gets up and ducks into a shop. Someone brushes past him as he’s looking through newspapers, and instead of an apology he hears a soft murmur. “Flight to Geneva in fifty minutes, gate 3,” Napoleon murmurs, and Illya ducks his head in acknowledgement.

It’s almost ridiculous, how easy it is to just walk onto the wrong plane and sit down. The stewardesses smile at him with perfectly manufactured smiles, and Illya briefly entertains the idea of recruiting some of them. They’d make excellent spies, he thinks. They are already impeccable at acting.

A moment later, he remembers that he might never be going back to UNCLE and the thought evaporates. He’s too good a spy to let the sudden restlessness show on his face, but it’s bad enough that he picks up his newspaper. The small effort of translating the French into English, and then into Russian, is enough to take a little of the edge off. He’s on the plane, and there’s little else he can do.

Napoleon hurries onto the plane a few minutes before the door closes. Illya watches him carefully over the top of the newspaper as Napoleon leans against a partition and chats to the stewardess. He’s carefully angled so only Illya can see the subtle movements of the hand that he’s hidden behind his back.

Illya picks up the general meaning, and nods slightly to himself when Napoleon brushes past him to find a seat. Two tails following Napoleon around the airport is not a good sign at all, but the rational part of Illya doubts it could be KGB. Even with all their ways of gathering information, they couldn’t have known they’d be at this airport, or get people here quickly enough to tail them.

An hour into the flight, Napoleon wanders past and drops a handkerchief just as he is next to Illya. Both bend to pick it up at the same time.

“Did they follow you onto the plane?” Illya asks in a soft murmur. Napoleon shakes his head.

“Lost them in the airport,” he replies, straightening up and brushing off his suit. “Don’t think they were KGB, didn’t look or act like it. Might have just been agents who knew of me and were in the airport by chance.”

Illya pretends to laugh at something Napoleon just said. “Nothing we can do about it now,” he murmurs. “We’re safe enough on the plane.” Even if there were agents who had somehow gotten onto the plane, they couldn’t do anything thousands of feet up in the air and surrounded by civilians.

He spends an hour reading the newspaper as thoroughly as he can to pass the time, and then has nothing left to do. The restlessness comes back to grab hold of him, and he lasts about twenty minutes before he opens up the newspaper again.

The flight passes excruciatingly slowly, even more so given that Illya can’t help but think about everything that’s happened over the past few days. He feels like a terrible spy, because the thing that occupies his thoughts the most is Napoleon.

He can’t help but wonder what will happen between them now. Napoleon is sitting on this plane right now, apparently fully committed to running with him from the KGB, which is arguably one of the most brutal intelligence agencies in the world. Napoleon is risking his life for him, and Illya thinks he shouldn’t be focusing on that because they risk their lives for each other all the time, but this is different.

He wonders if things will ever be the same again, after this. In one way or another, things are going to change, whether it’s him and Napoleon, or his status as UNCLE, or if he can ever live under his own name again. It’s something to be afraid of, but in a distant, abstract way, like how he knows he should be afraid of polar bears if on assignment in Siberia. Up here, thousands of feet above the Atlantic Ocean, it’s easy enough to not think that far ahead into the future.

He’d been taught long ago that to look so far ahead was pointless. He didn’t know if he’d be alive to see it.

The flight takes nearly nine hours, and Illya forces himself not to sleep at any point, just in case. He nearly stumbles coming off the plane when it finally lands in Geneva, and it earns him a sympathetic smile from a stewardess. He can almost feel Napoleon’s gaze on his back.

Immigration is surprisingly easy with a French passport and a story about defection and victimhood on his lips, and he’s through and standing on Swiss soil. He waits for a few moments, as if working out where the taxis are, and starts walking down the road.

Less than a minute later Napoleon falls into step beside him. “We weren’t followed off the flight,” he murmurs. “The safehouse is outside the village of Crans-près Céligny, which isn’t too far away. It’s an old villa on the lakefront.”

“Steal a car?” Illya asks, and Napoleon looks mildly shocked.

“Always so brutal, Peril,” he says. “No, I need to go to a bank first.” He waves down a taxi. “There is a reason this safehouse is in Switzerland, you know.”

0-o-0-o-0

Illya can’t help but gape as Napoleon turns onto a long gravel drive. They’ve passed through a security gate already, Napoleon pointing out the various defences built into the gate and the walls surrounding the garden. “There’s pressure sensors placed under strategic places in the lawn as well,” he says as he drives the car he’d just bought, with cash taken from a deposit box in a bank in Geneva, down the drive towards the house up ahead.

“Your bank accounts are deeper than I thought,” Illya mutters as he twists around to look at the drive behind them. Already he’s cataloguing how he’d try and break into the house. So far, it looks difficult.

“I’ll admit, this all took a fair chunk,” Napoleon says. “But it’s worth it to have somewhere as impenetrable as this. Nothing can be traced back to me, either.” He pulls up in front of the house and kills the engine. “I’ll clear the first floor, you clear the ground.” He is already pulling his gun from his holster as he gets out. Illya, shaking some of the wonder from him and reverting to the innate instincts of a spy, follows.

It takes them nearly two hours to clear both the house and the gardens, and for Illya to learn the various defences of the safehouse. Finally they stop, stuttering to a halt only to realise that neither of them knows what to do now they’ve stopped running.  

Napoleon speaks first. “You should take some weight off that leg,” he says, holstering his pistol. “I need to go into town and get things like groceries, or we’re going to have very little to eat.”

“Is that safe?” Illya asks sceptically, limping over to the couch and slumping down onto it. He winces as he toes off his boots and props his leg up on the coffee table.

“It’s been a few years since I’ve been back here, but I have contacts in the town that I’ve kept up with,” Napoleon says as he grabs his coat and the car keys. “You’d be surprised how many international thieves and agents retire to Switzerland. Anyway, the town is safer than your average Swiss town. The retirees here don’t like being disturbed.”

Illya watches him as he wanders over to the bookshelf that spans the wall next to the fireplace, and picks one out. “Here,” Napoleon says, tossing the book to Illya. “To keep you occupied until I’m back.”

Illya studies the cover, and then snorts. “Shakespeare, Cowboy?”

Napoleon points at the book. “Your Russian novelists could learn a thing or two from him,” he says with a wry smile. “Security camera feed is in that cupboard there, if you want to watch absolutely nothing happen. I’ll see if the bakery is still open when I’m in town.”

“Chocolate as well,” Illya says as he flicks through the book. “Nobody does it better than the Swiss.”

“I’ll have to disagree with you on that, because the Belgians do the best chocolate, but yes, I’ll see what I can find,” Napoleon says. Illya gives him a look, trying his best to hide the discomfort of Napoleon leaving. He must be more tired than he thinks, because Napoleon’s expression softens slightly.

“They can’t have followed us here,” he says, pausing at the door. “We have Gaby, and maybe even Waverly running interference for us. Even if they manage to follow us to Geneva, they have no idea where we’ve gone from there. They won’t find this house.” Illya still feels sceptical, and Napoleon sighs, crossing over to the couch.

“They’re not going to get you,” he says, leaning against the arm of the couch. “I won’t let them.” There’s a sincerity to his voice that has become more and more common since Illya had a building blown up on top of him, and it automatically makes Illya relax slightly. Napoleon smiles softly. “There’s a lightweight machine gun in the armoury upstairs,” he adds. “And some grenades. Just in case.”

He leaves, locking the door behind him. Illya tries to quell the unease that’s throbbing through him, and starts to read. He lasts about five minutes before he gets up, opens the cupboard so he can see the feeds from the cameras all around the house and gardens, and fetches a sniper rifle to sit on the coffee table. His pistol he keeps in his holster, even though it digs into his side. That makes him feel slightly better.

It takes nearly an hour and a half before Illya sees movement on the camera feeds, and the gates drift open as Napoleon guides the car through. It takes a few minutes for him to get from the gates to unlocking the door, and as soon as he steps through the door he arches a brow.

“A little paranoid?” he asks as he takes in the sniper rifle on the coffee table. Illya shrugs, and pretends to be immersed in Shakespeare.

“It’s not paranoid if they’re actually after you,” he points out. He looks up just in time to see a bar of chocolate being thrown straight at his head.

Illya huffs as he catches it a few inches from his face. “Don’t eat it all,” Napoleon warns as he juggles the grocery bags towards the kitchen. “I’m making beef bourguignon for dinner, and the bakery was open, so I bought the last few éclairs.”

Illya just nods. Napoleon is rushing around the kitchen in a way that wouldn’t look like rushing to anyone who didn’t know him well enough, but they’ve pretty much lived in each other’s pockets for over a year now. He knows what it looks like when Napoleon is nervous and trying to hide it.

Napoleon chatters on about the nearby town and the various people there as he cooks. Illya listens to the important parts, filing away information on the best escape routes and the contacts that could possibly be trusted, but the rest of it he tunes out in favour of watching Napoleon.

“Cowboy,” he says when Napoleon repeats the same thing he’d said about ten minutes ago. “I know.”

Napoleon stutters to a stop, paused halfway through stirring the bourguignon. Illya watches as his shoulders tense. “You told me they won’t find us,” he says to Napoleon, his voice quiet but no less forceful for it. “You told me that they can’t find this house. Do you not believe yourself?”

Napoleon sighs, and drops his head. He lets the spoon drop into the pan. “I don’t know,” he murmurs, glancing at Illya. “I want to. All of the years I spent running from various law agencies, and they never found this house. I doubt that the KGB could. But,” he sighs again, and leans against the side. “I’m not sure.” He huffs a bitter laugh. “Nobody ever is in this damn game.”

“Calling it a game implies that someone wins,” Illya points out. “I don’t think anybody wins this.”

“What would you call it, then?” Napoleon asks, a bitter edge to his voice. Illya shrugs.

“War,” he says simply. Napoleon stares at him, and then suddenly laughs.

“Really?” he asks.

Illya just holds his gaze and nods. “Russia has been at war for more years than America has been a country, if you add it up,” he says. “It is…” He frowns, searching for the word. “ _Ukorenivshiysya_?” he asks.

“Entrenched,” Napoleon supplies, and Illya nods.

“It is entrenched in our culture,” he continues. “In our history.”

Napoleon snorts in amusement. “You haven’t listened to what they teach in history classes in America,” he says. “All they talk about is the wars we’ve won.” He turns back to the pan on the hob. “Incredibly self-centred, if I say so myself.”

Illya waves a hand. “Yes, and we are taught similar, but I think our…cynicism counts towards us here. I heard many stories of how much we lost in our wars as I grew up, even if we won them in the end.” He winces as he pulls himself more upright on the couch. “Every Russian knows that you don’t win a war without a lot of casualties. I don’t know if that counts as winning.”

“That’s a rather fatalistic way of looking at it,” Napoleon muses. “But true, I suppose.” He pauses, and then looks over at Illya. “You really see all this, what we do, like that?”

“I suppose,” Illya says with a shrug. “You can’t have a winner in what we do. Surviving is the best reward I think we can get.”

“Surely you must want more,” Napoleon says, and Illya feels his heart thrum in desperation. _Yes,_ he thinks. _I want more. I want it so much I can feel it in my bones._ But he holds his tongue, and Napoleon, with a strange look that Illya can’t quite decipher, turns back to the stove.

“I don’t know,” Illya says suddenly. Napoleon glances over at him and must see something on his face, because he stops paying attention to the hob and turns to face him. Illya can’t hold his gaze, and looks down at the rug.

“I never used to,” he says. “But then KGB hardly encourages you to want more.” Napoleon’s snort means he knows how much of an understatement that is, but he says nothing and just waits for Illya to continue. He does, the words sticking to his throat.

“UNCLE is still a spy agency,” he says slowly. “And so ultimately, it is the same. But enough is different that…” He trails off, and ultimately it is the look on Napoleon’s face, one that might just be desperation and a kind of longing, that makes him finish.

“I want more,” he says. “I want more to my life than just surviving.”

Napoleon nods, and Illya thinks he looks relieved. “Found it yet?” he asks. “What it is that’s more than just surviving?”

Illya thinks of Napoleon taking his hand when he’s barely awake in a hospital bed, sitting there every time he wakes up for those first few days where he can barely keep it together. He thinks of Gaby, with her fierce eyes and fiercer loyalty. He thinks of the warmth of Napoleon pressing into his side as he sits next to him on the bed, his voice soft as he reads aloud late into the night.

“Maybe,” he says hesitantly. “I think… I think I might have.” Napoleon smiles, a genuine curl of his lips, and Illya can’t help but return it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So back in the 60s, it was ridiculously easy to get onto the wrong plane in an airport- security was negligible, and you could literally just walk onto a plane. My uncle once was very hungover when he made it to the airport to fly back to Switzerland (this was in the 80s) and he just staggered onto the plane and collapsed in the seat. He was there for a solid half hour before the captain announced that the flight to Lagos, Nigeria, was getting ready to depart.... He got onto the right plane eventually, but only just.
> 
> Oh, Crans-près Céligny is a real village, and is really on the shores of Lake Geneva, a little while outside of the city. Napoleon's house is actually based on an old farmhouse for sale right now on the edge of the village, because sometimes I can't stop myself when it comes to historical accuracy.
> 
> The boys are finally coming together, but you'll have to wait and see just how it happens.
> 
> Love you all.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little bit more angst, but a lot of hope, and things are starting to fall into place.

They sleep in shifts for the first night. Napoleon bullies Illya to bed first, even though Illya is fairly sure he hasn’t slept since they left the US. But his leg is throbbing and his ribs are aching, and there’s the weight of everything dragging him down. It isn’t long before he’s pulled under by sleep.

He wakes to someone calling his name, and his hand goes for the pistol on the bedside table before he realises it’s just Napoleon. “Anything happen, Cowboy?” he asks as he pushes back the covers and gets up, trying to force the sleepiness out of his voice. Judging by the slight smirk on Napoleon’s face, he’s not very successful.

“Absolutely nothing,” Napoleon replies. “I know that doesn’t mean there won’t be something, but I also know your brand of paranoia.” Illya rolls his eyes as he puts on his shoes and pulls on a jacket, tucking his pistol into his holster.

“I have- _we_ have KGB breathing down back of necks,” he mutters. “That makes it not paranoia. You have no idea of reach of KGB.”

“You have no idea how much effort I put into making this place impossible to find, let alone break into,” Napoleon points out. “Seriously, I spent three weeks trying to break in just to shore up the defences. And my contacts in the town know to be on the lookout. We really are as safe as I can possibly make us.”

Illya sighs. “I’m not blaming you, Cowboy,” he says as he brushes past him. “But like you said,” he shrugs, heading towards the stairs, “you know my brand of paranoia.”

Napoleon smirks. “I thought it wasn’t paranoia?” he asks, and Illya gives him a look as he goes downstairs for his watch.

Even with their vigilance the night passes uneventfully, and the next day does as well. Napoleon spends a few hours running errands in town, but they both decide it is best if nobody knows Illya is here, so he has to stay cooped up in the house for the whole day. Even going into the gardens is too risky, and it only takes a couple of hours before he starts to go out of his mind, restlessness and fear thrumming under his skin with nowhere for it to go.

Napoleon gives him a slightly sympathetic look when he comes back to find Illya taking apart and cleaning the sniper rifle, and throws him something. “You’re terrible at these, so it should keep you occupied,” he says, and Illya examines the small box in his hands. There’s no obvious lid, and he sighs.

“Really?” he asks. “You have stupid puzzle boxes here as well?”

“Hey, your armoury at home is one of those stupid puzzle boxes,” Napoleon points out. “You asked me to design it for you.”

“That’s practical,” Illya huffs. “These are pointless, and unnecessarily complicated.”

“Says someone who’s never been a thief,” Napoleon says with a grin. “The challenge is part of the fun.” He heads into the kitchen to make something up for lunch, and Illya sets aside the puzzle box to help.

“Who are these contacts anyway?” Illya asks over a lunch of soup and fresh bread Napoleon had brought back from the boulangerie in town.

Napoleon shrugs. “A couple retired agents I know, and then a retired forger friend of mine who I’d met after the war.” He tears off another piece of bread and mops up the last of his soup. “Wasn’t ever good friends with him, but kept in contact over the years.”

“CIA agents?” Illya asks. “They know you’re here?” There’s a quell of worry that he doesn’t bother to keep from his face. Napoleon sees it, and frowns slightly.

“Retired,” he emphasises. “They don’t want any disturbances here. Anyway, one of them is Mossad and another is BND, and they were all fairly corrupt when in service, otherwise I wouldn’t have known them as a thief. There’s a gentleman’s agreement of sorts between them to not do anything except the occasional game of chess and attempted break-ins.” Illya feels a shot of alarm at that, and Napoleon laughs. “Don’t worry, they know not to attempt one here. I saw one yesterday and let him know, subtly enough.”

Illya nods, and stares into his soup for a moment. “So what’s the plan?” he asks as he looks back up at Napoleon.

Napoleon quirks a brow. “The plan, Peril?” he asks. “Planning an offensive, are we?” Illya levels him with a look, and he huffs a laugh. “The plan is to wait here until Gaby contacts us. If she doesn’t in three weeks, then we move on. I was thinking we’ll go further afield, if we have to. Buy a yacht and move around the Mediterranean for a while to throw anyone off our tracks, seeing as you can sail. I have another safehouse in Japan, and another one in New Zealand. We could bounce around the Pacific for a while, I think.”

Illya nods. “Might want to stay clear of Vietnam though, Cowboy,” he points out. “Sure to be CIA in the area, and probably KGB as well.”

Napoleon hums in agreement. “Yes, that’s turning into an awful mess,” he muses. “I think Kennedy made a mistake in trying to use Vietnam as a show of US strength. And then when the CIA helped orchestrate the coup against Diệm, that only threw things into more chaos.” He looked askance at Illya. “I don’t suppose the KGB helped with that particular chaos, did they?”

Illya just shrugs. “I was with you in Norway when that coup happened,” he pointed out. “Besides, the KGB hardly tell me anything anymore.” There’s a bitter note that he can’t keep out his voice, and Napoleon frowns.

“Do you miss it?” he asks softly.

Illya gives him an unimpressed look. “We wouldn’t be here if I did,” he says dryly. “You said it yourself, returning to them is a death sentence, one way or another.”

Napoleon waves a hand. “Yes, but you can still miss parts of it without wanting to go back,” he points out.

“Do you miss the CIA?” Illya shoots back.

“Hell no,” Napoleon says quickly. “I’d still like to disembowel Sanders and half the people I worked with there. But then I had a life before them.” He leans back in his chair and studies Illya, toying with a piece of bread. The crumbs scatter on the kitchen table.

“And I didn’t?” Illya asks, even though he already knows the answer.

“Peril, you know the answer to that one,” Napoleon says softly. He pauses, perhaps to try and find the right words. “How old were you when your father was taken, ten? I can’t imagine it wasn’t much longer after that happened that the KGB started taking an interest.”

He immediately knows he’s stepped wrong somehow when Illya’s shoulders tense, and there’s a slight shake in one of his hands before he pulls back control. “I don’t want to play your games, Cowboy,” he snaps. “Don’t push it like that.”

“It’s not a game,” Napoleon says quickly. “But we’re on the run from the KGB right now, and honestly I need to know that you’re not going to suddenly decide to try and get them to take you back.” Illya rolls his eyes, and Napoleon gives him a look. “You can’t deny that it’s a possibility,” he says pointedly. “All your life, what have you been without the KGB?”

Illya’s expression sets in stone. “You don’t get to ask me that,” he says, pushing his bowl away from him and crossing his arms.

“Why?” Napoleon asks, pressing on. “Because I know the answer?” He leans back in his chair. “Peril, I’m just trying to understand so I can help you.”

Illya scoffs. “It’s never that simple with you,” he says before he really thinks about the words. Napoleon’s face falls at the words, and Illya winces.

“Fine, I’ll stop prying,” Napoleon says. He gathers up his bowl and dumps it in the sink, and leaves the kitchen without another word. Illya groans, and drops his head to the table. Regret is becoming a familiar taste to him now.

0-o-0-o-0

Napoleon wanders around the gardens for a while, checking the perimeter alarm systems and the gardens but really avoiding Illya. The more he thinks about it, the more he wonders if he was right, and somehow Illya misses his life in the KGB. He doesn’t doubt that he misses Russia. He’s seen enough to know that Russia is anchored into Illya’s bones and will be a long time from now, but the KGB is a different story altogether. He doesn’t know if, after all these years spent dying for the KGB, being told over and over again it’s for Russia, Illya can separate the two anymore.

He comes back in to find Illya sitting at the couch, a half-empty bottle of vodka in front of him. As Napoleon watches, leaning against the doorway of the glass doors that lead out to the gardens at the back, Illya reaches for the bottle again.

“Is that really a good idea with your pain medication?” he asks from the doorway. He’s surprised to see Illya flinch slightly, and set the vodka bottle down. Napoleon sighs and walks over to take the bottle away.

“Vodka?” he asks. “Right now? Christ Peril, what would you have done if the damn KGB had turned up?”

Illya looks up at him. “You are here,” he says simply, as if that fixes everything. Napoleon half wonders if it just adds to their problems.

“Yeah, well I’m not indestructible, am I?” he says. Illya doesn’t say anything, just stares into the middle distance, and Napoleon heaves a sigh. “Okay, what the hell is wrong? Other than the obvious, of course.”

Illya shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it,” he mutters, slurring into Russian halfway through. Napoleon feels a familiar exasperation, but underneath there is a thrum of worry. It’s very rare that he’s sees Illya drunk at all, let alone as far gone as this. He sits down next to Illya, and tries not to show any alarm when Illya sways where he’s sat.

“You don’t ever drink,” he starts off with, switching into Russian. “Not like this. So obviously, something is wrong.”

Illya huffs. “We are on the run from the KGB, and if they find me they will kill me,” he mutters, leaning forwards over his knees. “Now I’ve left like this, I won’t ever be allowed back. They’ll execute me first.”

Napoleon considers his next words carefully, and shuts out the image of Illya being executed from his head. He’s sure that’s going to give him nightmares in the days to come. “Do you want to go back?” he asks. For a moment Illya looks like he’s going to shut off and not say anything, but then he sighs, and shakes his head.

“You were right,” he murmurs.

“I usually am, but about what in particular this time?” Napoleon asks. He shifts slightly closer to Illya, aching to reach out and touch but keeping his hands still. Illya doesn’t even look at him, just stares at the floor.

“My father was taken when I was ten,” Illya says slowly, as if he’s struggling to find the words. “You know this. But I was…KGB knew me even before then.” Napoleon arches a brow, and Illya shrugs. “What better way to control a Party member than to have his son in the army?” he asks. “What better way to spy on a Party member than through his son? I only knew years later, of course, but…you were right. Never had a life when the KGB have not been watching.”

Seeing Illya right now, Napoleon doesn’t feel too happy about being right. “That can’t be what’s gotten to you,” he says instead of the thousand things crowding his tongue that he knows would be far too embarrassing to say whilst he is sober. “We’re all watched, and you’ve had years to come to terms with that.”

Illya shakes his head, taking the vodka bottle from Napoleon’s hand. He takes another drink and then hands it back, to Napoleon’s surprise. “I’ve never had a life without the KGB,” he says slowly. “I don’t know what I would be without them.”

The confusion and longing in his voice is enough to set Napoleon’s teeth on edge. “You’d be a lot less damaged, that’s what you’d be,” he says fiercely. Illya is drunk enough to just look up at him and shake his head.

“Without them, would have still lost my father,” he says frankly, even if his words are slurring. “My mother still would have done everything she could to make sure we survived, and it still would not have been enough. If the KGB had not taken me, I would be dead.”

“With the KGB, you will eventually be dead,” Napoleon points out with a little more bite than was perhaps necessary. “You said it yourself, most agents don’t often last longer than six years.”

Illya waves one hand. “A bullet is better than starving to death,” he says simply.

Napoleon stares at him. He doesn’t want to imagine Illya if the KGB had never gotten their hands on him, because he can’t fit together the two images he has in his mind: a smiling young man who had never seen everything the Illya he knows has endured, far too good for Napoleon to even touch, and a child dead before his time to illness or the cold or starvation before Napoleon was ever allowed to know him.

“I suppose I wouldn’t know,” he says eventually. “Which would be better. What’s your point, though?” He rather suspects he knows what it is now, but he thinks Illya needs to say it.

Illya goes back to staring at the floor. “I owe them my life,” he says. “That’s a debt I cannot repay.”

That is exactly what Napoleon was expecting to hear, but it still burns him. “I think you’ve paid it a thousand times over,” he says fiercely. “I know only a fraction of what you’ve done for them, but even that is more than enough to pay your debt.”

Illya shakes his head. “It won’t ever be enough,” he slurs. He reaches for the vodka again but Napoleon holds it out of his reach. Illya nearly overbalances, and Napoleon steadies him.

“I think you’ve had enough vodka now,” he says softly. “And it will be enough. It is enough. You’ve bled and fought and nearly died for them so many times now, that if anything they owe you for it all.” Illya doesn’t look convinced, and Napoleon puts down the vodka so he can wrap an arm over Illya’s shoulders.

“You have bled enough for them,” he tells Illya. “And they don’t deserve you. Dammit Illya, you’ve helped save the world from another godforsaken war more times than they even know, and they’ve given you nothing for it.”

“They let me live,” Illya says, his voice sombre even as the vodka makes it slur. “They give me my life.”

Napoleon drops his head. “Oh, Illya,” he says softly, tugging Illya towards him so Illya’s head falls to his shoulder. Napoleon resists the urge to card his fingers through Illya’s hair, but keeps hold of him. “That’s not theirs to give,” he murmurs. “That’s never belonged to them. I promise, you are so much more than what they did to you, and you are more than what they tried to make you.”

Illya huffs, and Napoleon can feel him shake his head where it’s resting against his shoulder. “When would I lie to you?” Napoleon asks, and he can feel the slight curve of Illya’s lips and the soft laugh against his shoulder. “Okay, maybe don’t answer that one. But I’m not lying to you now.”

“If you were only what the KGB has made you, do you think you would have burned that disc with me?” Napoleon asks. “Would you have joined UNCLE?” Illya’s silence is all he needs for an answer, and he nods. “Exactly. You’re a better man than you think you are. And before you say anything about your kill count or whatever you think you’ve done that means you are too far gone for redemption, what you’ve done to survive is not…” He sighs, trying to find the right words. “What you’ve done does not make you who you are.”

Illya doesn’t reply, but then Napoleon supposes that in his position, he wouldn’t know what to say either. For a few moments they sit there together on the couch in silence, Illya’s head resting on Napoleon’s shoulder. For a brief moment Napoleon wishes they could just remain there, but there’s half a bottle of vodka in Illya and a couch is a terrible place to sleep, even without a leg and ribs still healing.

“Come on,” he says, pulling Illya up from the couch. “Let’s get you to bed. You’re going to have an awful hangover in the morning.”

“I am Russian,” Illya slurs. “Don’t get hangovers.”

Napoleon snorts, and helps Illya get up the stairs. “You can tell me that again in the morning,” he says with a huff of laughter. He gets Illya into his room, and Illya is coherent enough to pull off his shoes and jacket before falling back onto the bed. “Sleep off the vodka,” Napoleon says as he pulls the door to, his voice softening. “It will look better in the morning. It always does.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BND was the German equivalent of the CIA during the 60s (West German, but that all gets complicated). Mossad is the Israeli equivalent.  
> Kennedy escalated US involvement in Vietnam during the early 1960s (61-63) but regular combat missions didn't happen there until 1965. The CIA were in contact with generals wanting to overthrow the current leader of Vietnam, Diệm, and told the generals the US wouldn't oppose it (he was overthrown in Nov 63) and everything became very unstable. At the time the boys are talking about this in this chapter, spring of 64, it's only a few months before Gulf of Tonkin incident, which led to the US becoming much more heavily involved in the war. If you have time, do some reading on Wikipedia- it's very interesting.
> 
> I've been playing a long waiting game here, with these two, but it's starting to all become okay.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please don't shout at me too much once you've finished this chapter....

Illya wakes up to a glass of water and the bottle of his painkillers on the bedside table, and one hell of a headache. It takes a few minutes for the painkillers to kick in, but once they do the throbbing in his leg and ribs fades down to a more manageable level, and his headache lessens, at least enough for him to get up.

There’s the smell of bacon drifting through the house, and Illya follows it downstairs to find Napoleon, apron on and in front of the stove. As Illya watches the pan hisses and spits, and Napoleon snatches his fingers back with a muffled curse.

“What are you doing, Cowboy?” he asks, shuffling into the kitchen and ignoring the throbbing in his head, leg and ribs at the movement. Napoleon smirks as he all but collapses into one of the chairs.

“Feeling the vodka, are we?” he asks instead of answering Illya. “The bacon is going to be done in a couple of minutes, and then there’s going to be scrambled eggs as well, and French toast.” He flips the bacon over in the pan. “Best cure for a hangover is a good fry up.”

“Best cure for hangover is more vodka,” Illya mutters, but when Napoleon puts a plate in front of him he digs in. Napoleon makes some more and then sits down at the table with him. Illya eyes him warily for a few moments, but Napoleon doesn’t mention anything about last night.

Despite the vodka, Illya remembers most of what happened last night. He doesn’t particularly want to talk about this whilst sober, but then there are a lot of things that they don’t talk about unless drunk or dying. It is the nature of their lives that they could end at any moment, and for the most part there’s little point talking about it.

“No pancakes?” he asks, instead of the many things crowding his tongue that are begging to be heard by Napoleon. Napoleon laughs, and spears another piece of bacon with his fork.

“Not enough milk,” he says through his mouthful. “Besides, if you want proper thick pancakes I need to get some buttermilk. I’ll make some tomorrow.” He grabs another piece of bacon, this time with his fingers, and Illya huffs a laugh. Napoleon is far from the suave international agent here, his hair tousled and curled, wearing pyjama pants and a cotton shirt, and licking bacon grease from his fingers. Illya wonders what it is that makes Napoleon feel safe enough to let down his guard like this.

They talk aimlessly for a little while. Yesterday’s newspaper is lying on the table, and Napoleon picks it up and rifles through it. “Have you seen this?” he asks, flipping over a page and showing Illya an article. “Malcolm X has made another speech.”

Illya hums. “What has he said?” he asks, skimming the article. It’s in French, but it doesn’t slow either of them down. He hums again, reading part of the transcript. “He certainly has way with words. The ballot or the bullet? Very good.”

“Yes, but I prefer King myself,” Napoleon says, taking the newspaper back and reading through the article on the speech. “Less inflammatory. A call to arms, if repeated enough, is only going to end in violence.”

“It’s already ending in violence,” Illya points out. “It’s been ending in violence for centuries, and not just in America. Look at what’s happening to Mandela in South Africa. Time and time again, people are repressed and pushed down, and nothing changes until they fight back.”

Napoleon hums, looking unconvinced. “But look at the Suffragette movement in Britain,” he points out. “They turned to violence to try and win the vote for women, and the men in parliament just thought they were unstable. In some ways, it might have lessened the effectiveness of their campaign. It wasn’t until the war, when it was women who held the country together, that those idiots over in the British parliament saw what the women had been fighting for all that time.”

“But they still fought for it,” Illya says. “Same with what’s happening in America right now. If nobody fights for it, nothing will happen.”

“I’m not saying they shouldn’t fight,” Napoleon hedges. “Just that violence might not be effective when it comes to changing the minds of those racist idiots in the Senate. Unfortunately, progress can sometimes mean playing by the rules of the oppressors. That doesn’t mean it’s not still a fight.”

Illya shakes his head, but he doesn’t argue back about it. “Chess?” Napoleon asks as he and Illya clear the table. “With you this hungover, I might actually have a chance.”

Illya smirks slightly. “I doubt it, Cowboy.”

0-o-0-o-0

True to his word, Illya defeats Napoleon in about fifteen moves in their first chess game. He can’t help but stare at Napoleon as the man gapes at the chessboard, and he nearly sits on his hands to stop himself reaching out to touch him. “You do realise I’m very good at chess?” he asks Napoleon, to try and distract himself from the way Napoleon pushes his tousled hair back from his face. “You’re not going to win for a long time.”

Napoleon actually pouts. “It’s not fair.”

“Who said anything about this being fair?” Illya says. “I could have done that in six moves, but I was being…what’s the word? Not selfish?”

“Generous?” Napoleon offers. “That’s still not fair. If you’re going to beat me, then just do it. Ripping the band-aid off, and all that.” He starts setting the board up for another game, and Illya slouches back as best as he can with ribs that are still healing. He watches Napoleon move the pieces, and then has to look away when he realises he’s staring.

He’s studying the fireplace, old stonework and cast-iron grating, when he realises something and turns to Napoleon. “This is safehouse, yes?” he asks. “You built this when you were thief?”

Napoleon nods, though there’s a slight frown creasing his forehead. “The house was already standing, so technically I refurbished it, but yes. Why do you ask?”

Illya looks around the living room, at the bare walls that seem so obvious to him now. “Where is art?” he asks. “You must have kept some here, and house has never been raided or you wouldn’t be so sure it is safe. So where is the art?”

Napoleon’s face lights up, and he gets to his feet. Curious, Illya follows him as he heads across the room. “I didn’t just get this house because of my weakness for authentic flagstone tiled floors,” he says as he heads over to one of the bookshelves along the wall. “Alongside the town, the great sightlines from any upstairs window and the gravel walkway surrounding the house that makes it nearly impossible to break in silently, one of the other reasons I bought this house was because it has an excellent cellar.” He pulls some sort of switch, and swings back the bookshelf to reveal a door.

“This used to be a wine cellar, and then before that was probably used to store meats,” Napoleon says over his shoulder as he leads Illya down a steep flight of stairs. Only a few feet below the ground and the cold is already setting in. “I had to do some slight renovations to the cellar to make sure it was the right temperature and humidity, but it didn’t take long.”

There’s a door at the bottom of the stairs, and Napoleon keys in a code to open it. He grins over his shoulder at Illya as he steps through and flicks on a light. “There are many people in the world who would kill for the contents of this room,” he tells him. “Right now, the two of us are the only ones who know about it.”

Illya stares. The cellar is probably quite small, but the sheer amount of things in it makes it somehow look larger. There are paintings hanging up from shelves that criss-cross the room, from ones as small as a piece of paper to a large canvas that takes up the entire back wall. In between sit sculptures, some carefully wrapped to preserve them, others on full display.

He wanders across the room, Napoleon grinning as he follows him. “The cellar is carefully insulated and vented to make sure it stays at the right temperatures and humidity, so the art isn’t damaged,” he says over Illya’s shoulder as he stops in front of a painting, something that looks similar to the image of the painting in that art book in Napoleon’s penthouse. It seems like years ago that they looked at it.

“How many pieces are in here?” he asks, wandering through the shelves.

“About thirty, I believe,” Napoleon says. “My favourites, mostly, or pieces too hot to sell on without endangering myself.” He drifts away from Illya and pauses in front of another painting. “I’ve had this one since 1945,” he muses. “Took it from a collection of art that the Nazis had intended to burn.”

Illya glances over at the painting, an abstract piece of various shades of black and grey. “I didn’t know you’d kept paintings for that long,” he says. “Thought you sold most of what you stole, especially from the war.”

Napoleon hums, tracing the lines of the painting, his fingers hovering just above the canvas. “Usually, but a few pieces I keep for sentimental reasons. I have another, smaller, cache back home.” He lets his hand drop, and moves on to another painting. “Did you know that the reason the Mona Lisa is so famous is that it was stolen from the Louvre in 1911?”

Illya shakes his head, following Napoleon around the cellar now, and Napoleon smiles slightly. “Some art I would steal and then let them be found again,” he says. “Or take from some rich man’s cellar and give to a museum. Art deserves to be seen, after all. Not all of it was for profit.”

He sees something and walks over to another painting. This one is small, a splash of colour in between its more sombre neighbours. Napoleon takes it off the shelf carefully, holding the frame with an almost reverent touch. “This is the Renoir I mentioned, back on the plane out of the US,” he murmurs. “I’d forgotten how much I love it.”

“What is it called?” Illya asks, looking over Napoleon’s shoulder. Napoleon glances up at him, and Illya realises with a jolt just how close they are.

“ _Paysage Bords de Seine_ ,” Napoleon says. He glances up at Illya and pauses for a moment. Illya can’t help but shift towards him, and Napoleon blinks. He brushes past Illya, the painting still in his hands. “I should hang it up in the living room. It’s been far too long since I’ve been back here, and the walls need some life.”

It takes Napoleon nearly five minutes to decide where he wants to hang the painting, eventually settling on the first place that he’d picked, above the fireplace. “Look at it, Peril,” he says with a smile, adjusting the frame slightly so it sits perfectly straight. “You can see how this is the beginning of Impressionism, the small brushstrokes and the intense colour. The conventional art community hated them at first, especially in France. This type of painting, colour and light taking precedence over lines and counters, was actually considered radical, and violating the rules of painting.” He huffs a laugh, eyes not leaving the painting above the fireplace.

Napoleon keeps talking, and Illya knows he should be looking at the painting, but he can’t tear his eyes away from him. Napoleon’s face has lit up, his eyes bright, and Illya can’t help but remember that day in Vienna, where he had looked at Napoleon and thought: _Oh. I suppose this is it, then._

There’s the same rush through his veins that had nearly paralysed him in Vienna, which left him gasping out Napoleon’s name as he lay dying on the street, which has him reaching for Napoleon before he stops himself. Napoleon, oblivious to the turmoil that’s coursing through him, turns to Illya.

“So, Peril?” he asks. “What do you think?”

Illya kisses him.

It’s not a conscious decision, it’s not a conscious thought, but he can’t stand the regret anchoring deep in his bones that takes flight as soon as his lips touch Napoleon’s. For a brief second Napoleon is frozen still, but then he kisses Illya back, hand going to the back of Illya’s neck and pulling him down. Illya goes willingly, stumbling forwards with Napoleon. He can feel the hard planes of muscle beneath his hands, the warmth of Napoleon through his shirt, and he doesn’t ever want to let go.

Napoleon suddenly pulls back and Illya is left clutching at air. He desperately wants to reach out for him again, pull him forwards and gather him up in his arms, but he won’t ever do anything that Napoleon doesn’t want, so he forces himself to wait.

Napoleon stares at him, his hair tousled and lips swollen red. “Tell me if you don’t want this,” Illya says slowly, even though the words are like shrapnel.

Napoleon is still staring at him, and slowly reaches out to grasp the collar of Illya’s shirt. “I want this so much I can barely breathe,” he murmurs, his thumb smoothing across Illya’s neck. “But…this isn’t a good idea.”

“Why not?” Illya asks, reaching up and pulling Napoleon’s hand from his collar to lace his fingers with Napoleon’s. “I am already compromised, when it comes to you. Fuck everything else. I won’t spend the rest of my life regretting this.”

Napoleon stares at him. “I don’t think I could ever live with myself if I didn’t try this,” he says eventually. “I don’t want to live with that regret.” He sighs, and leans into Illya. Illya wraps his arms around him, and briefly closes his eyes when Napoleon rests his head on Illya’s shoulder and he can smell the shampoo Napoleon used this morning. “God, I don’t deserve you,” Napoleon mutters.

Illya stills, and pulls back slightly so he can look down at Napoleon. “Don’t ever say that,” he says, and Napoleon looks up when he hears the heat in his voice.

“It’s true,” he argues. “I’m not good enough for you. Hell, I’m not even a particularly good person. I’ll screw this up and then you’ll hate me for it, and I don’t think I could survive that.”

Illya scoffs. “I don’t think I could ever hate you,” he says softly. “And I’ll mess it up before you do.” He pulls Napoleon closer to him and presses a soft kiss to his lips. “You fix my watch,” he murmurs. “You steal art because you think it deserves to be seen by everyone.” He kisses Napoleon again, wrapping his arms around Napoleon’s waist. “You are brave,” he says. “And kind, and you deserve so much more than I could give you.”

Napoleon reaches one hand up, carefully cupping Illya’s cheek. “Now I know I definitely don’t deserve you,” he says, but there’s a smile he can’t keep from his face.

Illya finds an answering smile already curling his lips, and he can’t stop it. “And I don’t deserve you either,” he says. “That makes us even, Cowboy.”

Napoleon smiles, that genuine sharp smile of his that Illya fell in love with months ago, and pulls Illya down to him. “I think I can live with that,” he murmurs, and both of them are smiling too much to kiss properly.

Soon, though, it turns passionate and demanding, and Illya pushes Napoleon back up against the wall, pressing kisses along his jaw and down his neck. Napoleon moans, gripping Illya and pulling him up against him. “How long?” he murmurs, tipping his head back so the long line of his neck is exposed. “How long have you wanted this?”

“Since Vienna,” Illya breathes, kissing along Napoleon’s neck, nipping and sucking at his skin to leave bruises behind. “Since that museum. All that art in there, and you were the most beautiful thing I could see.”

Napoleon actually whines, and twists them so now he’s pressing Illya into the wall, pressing hot, open kisses over his face and neck. A moan slips through Illya’s lips and he runs his hands through Napoleon’s hair, pulling him up and kissing him again. “I only realised in Vienna,” he says breathlessly. He can’t look away from Napoleon’s face, the brightness in his eyes and he smiles helplessly at him. “I only realised then,” he repeats. “But I think I might have loved you even before.”

Napoleon’s expression softens. “Is that what this is, then?” he asks. He reaches up and runs his thumb along the silver skin of the scar above Illya’s eye. “Love?”

Illya’s breath is taken away by the look in Napoleon’s eyes. “If you want it to be,” he replies helplessly.

Napoleon groans, and pulls Illya down to him with a hand gripping the back of his neck. “Yes, god yes,” he murmurs against Illya’s lips. Illya can’t help but smile, can’t help but press another kiss to Napoleon’s lips.

“How long for you?” he murmurs against his lips.

“I don’t know,” Napoleon says breathlessly. “It was…we were in New York, months ago. You were in my apartment.” He kisses Illya again, pushing him back against the wall. “You laughed, and I’d never seen anything more beautiful.” Illya moans something in Russian, his voice too low for Napoleon to make out the words.

“Bedroom?” Napoleon asks, running his hands down Illya’s sides. Illya’s eyes darken, and he just nods before pushing off the wall and heading for the stairs, not letting go of Napoleon the entire time.

They leave a trail of clothes up the stairs and to the bedroom, laughing when Napoleon’s shirt gets stuck over his head or when Illya nearly trips on the stairs because he’s so intent on unbuckling Napoleon’s belt. Napoleon pushes him into the bedroom and Illya falls back on the bed willingly.

“Have you done this before?” Napoleon asks. “With men, I mean?”

“Not often, but yes,” Illya says. He sees Napoleon’s slight hesitation, so reaches out and grabs Napoleon’s wrist, pulling him on top of him. “I want this,” he tells him, kissing him again. “I’ve wanted this for months.” He grips Napoleon and pulls him closer, rewarded with a breathless moan from Napoleon.

“I want this too,” Napoleon murmurs, and he laughs at the smile that Illya can’t keep off his face. This is right. This is what he’s been waiting for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, hands up, who thought I was going to do something horrible to them when reading the note at the beginning?
> 
> I'm not completely evil, I promise. They've finally come together- it's taken them long enough- and we're heading back into the territory of domestic fluff once again. Seriously, once I finally got them together it was all I could do to hang onto the plot amongst the sheer amount of fluff overwhelming my brain.
> 
> Malcom X did make a speech entitled 'The Ballot or the Bullet' in early April of 1964. The abstract piece of art that Illya studies is actually a piece that has been missing since the war, presumed destroyed (obviously not here). Have a look at the list of art still missing from WWII, there's a lot somewhere out there! The piece is called En Canot, by Metzinger.
> 
> Uni is still slowly sucking the life out of me, but I'm actually ahead of schedule with writing lab reports, so I'm feeling surprisingly okay about it. We'll see whether this lasts....
> 
> Love you all!


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I want to clarify something before you guys read this next chapter.  
> I am a 19 year old girl. I am not a gay man. I don't know how two men have sex beyond what I have read in fic. Therefore, I will not be writing explicit scenes between Illya and Napoleon, as I don't feel like it's my place to do so. I have no problem with other people writing those scenes, regardless of their identity, but I will not be writing it.  
> The vast, vast majority of people who have commented on this fic have all been wonderful, and I love you all. Please keep it that way.
> 
> That all said, hope you enjoy this chapter!

Illya wakes up to the morning sun filtering in through curtains that they’d never shut the night before. He stretches slightly, wincing at the low ache in his leg and ribs, and turns his head to look at the person stretched out next to him.

Napoleon is still fast asleep, sprawled out over the bed. He has one arm reaching out, hand resting over Illya’s chest. Illya can see a bruise he left on Napoleon’s neck, and more splashes of colour against pale skin where he was holding onto him during the night. They’d taken a break for dinner, not bothering to do anything more than throw on boxers and make something simple, but they’d been up late into the night, learning each other’s bodies and the secrets written on them.

Illya reaches out and plays with Napoleon’s curls. He loves his hair when it’s not slicked back with pomade, the soft curls that he teases out around his fingers. Napoleon shifts in his sleep, his hand clutching gently at Illya’s chest. The scratches down Illya’s side, left by Napoleon’s seeking fingers last night, sting slightly in remembrance.

Napoleon murmurs something in his sleep and Illya waits for the flash of panic as he realises this is real. It doesn’t come. There’s some lingering worry over what will happen now, how this will change things in the future, but Illya knows that this is right.

His stomach growls, and Napoleon’s eyes crack open. “Morning,” Illya murmurs through a smile, and Napoleon frowns.

“Give me a second,” he mutters, stifling a yawn. “I only just woke up, I’m not up to thinking in anything but English yet.”

Illya blushes as he realises he spoke in Russian, but Napoleon laughs and presses a kiss to Illya’s shoulder. “I’m awake enough now,” he says, switching into Russian. “What time is it?”

Illya frowns, and twists to look at the clock on the mantelpiece. “Just before nine,” he says. He huffs. “We’re getting lazy.”

“Well, this is like a very tense, secretive holiday,” Napoleon points out. “We have nothing to do, so you might as well be…” He trails off, frowning. “How do you pronounce that word again?”

Illya huffs a laugh. “You are not awake enough for Russian, Cowboy,” he says in English.

“To be fair,” Napoleon says. “You certainly tired me out last night.” He runs his hand down Illya’s side, pushing at the sheets pooled around his waist. Illya smacks at his hand.

“You are incorrigible,” he says, but there’s a smile on his face as he does. “I had to learn that word in English just for you, did you know that?” Napoleon smirks, and presses a kiss to his lips in answer.

“That’s just the way you like me, Peril,” he says teasingly, and Illya’s glare is so obviously fake that he can’t help but laugh at it. Illya’s lips twitch, and then he rolls them over so he’s pinning down Napoleon on the bed.

“You are also infuriating,” he says, kissing his way down Napoleon’s neck and chest. “And insatiable.”

“I don’t know, you did quite a good job last night,” Napoleon says, just to see Illya blush. He does, but then kisses further down Napoleon’s chest, and Napoleon arches under the touch.

“I still wouldn’t have it any other way,” Illya says. He leans forward and Napoleon arches up to meet him in a kiss, soft and tender. There were bruising kisses last night, hot and demanding as they learnt each other’s bodies, but this is sweet, and no worse for it.

They break apart when Illya’s stomach growls, and Napoleon laughs. “You didn’t get any milk for pancakes yesterday, did you?” Illya asks.

Napoleon shakes his head, another laugh on his lips. “I’ll make it up to you,” he says with a wicked grin. “I can think of other things to do this morning.”

They don’t make it out of bed for another hour at least.

0-o-0-o-0

It’s awkward at first, in the way that new relationships often are, but Napoleon laughs at Illya’s blush and Illya can’t help but snort in amusement when Napoleon trips over his words, his usual silver tongue becoming stuck, unused to the sheer joy thrumming through his veins. They abandon the clothes they left in a trail to the bedroom last night, both agreeing in a look to deal with it later, and spend most of the day in pyjamas.

“We could have avoided so much hassle,” Napoleon muses as he fries some bacon. Illya hums, his head still in the cupboards as he hunts for plates. “Seriously,” Napoleon says, peeling up an edge of the bacon to see if it’s done yet. “Gaby is going to slap me again for all this, I’m sure.”

Illya huffs a laugh. “Again?”

“Oh, I mouthed off at Waverly when you were unconscious, and she slapped me for it,” Napoleon says to Illya over his shoulder. “Honestly, I deserved it. I really wasn’t in my right mind back then, said some rather awful things to Waverly which Gaby called me out on.” He huffs a laugh, but it falls short and he trails off into silence.

“What is it?” Illya says softly, padding over to him and wrapping his arms around Napoleon’s waist. Napoleon, grateful for the solid warmth, leans back into it.

He’s still wary of being vulnerable but this is Illya, this is the man he loves, so he sighs and lets his head fall back onto Illya’s shoulder. “That was after the first time we saw you,” he murmurs. “After the first surgery. You looked so small.”

He can still remember what Illya looked like, all of the tubes running from him, the beeping of the heart monitor. He can still remember the fear that had gripped his throat when he saw him.

Illya presses a kiss to Napoleon’s neck. “I’m alive,” he says softly. “I’m okay.” That’s all he can say, and Napoleon knows it. He can’t offer any promises of not being injured again, or to stay alive, because they are pointless in their line of work.

“I know you are,” Napoleon says with a slight smile. “But seeing you like that…” He trails off, and sighs. Illya just turns him around in his arms and kisses him softly, and Napoleon knows it’s the best he can offer, and it’s enough for him.

The pan of bacon spits behind them and Napoleon curses, grabbing a spatula and flipping the bacon over. Illya laughs, and pulls out eggs from the fridge. Just like that, things return to some semblance of normality.

“This does feel somewhat absurd,” Napoleon finds himself saying. He’s still wondering at moments if this is a dream. “I just never thought this would actually happen.” He puts the bacon on a plate to keep warm in the oven and starts on the scrambled eggs, smacking away Illya’s hand as he tries to sneak a piece of bacon.

“The world stands on absurdities,” Illya says, managing to get a piece of bacon whilst Napoleon is distracted by scrambling the eggs properly. “And without them perhaps nothing at all would happen.”

Napoleon frowns. “Where’s that from?” he asks, steadily scrambling the eggs in the bacon fat. “Sounds like a quote I should know, but I don’t recognise it.”

“ _The Brothers Karamazov_ ,” Illya says smugly. “You don’t recognise it because, as I have told you before, you have no class.” He watches impatiently over Napoleon’s shoulder for the eggs to be done before Napoleon shoos him away to cut slices of bread for toast.

“I was thinking,” Illya says slowly, over breakfast as they’re sat at the table. “There should be some…rules, for whatever this is.”

Napoleon nods. “Only fair,” he says, though he can’t help the thrum of worry through him. “Like what?”

“I won’t do anything you don’t want to,” Illya says seriously. “And you won’t do anything I don’t want to, in bedroom. If I say no and you don’t stop, I will break your hand.”

Napoleon reaches over and takes Illya’s hand to stop the fine tremors starting to shake it. “Of course,” he says gently, and when Illya looks at him there’s no pity in his eyes, merely understanding. “Another rule, perhaps, is that we don’t let this compromise missions. We’re already compromised about each other, but we can at least be professional when working.” He hesitates. “Apparently Waverly will turn a blind eye to this as long as we’re still effective.”

Illya raises Napoleon’s hand, pressing a kiss to the inside of his wrist. “If something is wrong, we tell each other,” he adds to the list. “We have enough secrets already.”

Napoleon nods, and then a slow grin spreads across his face. “How about getting rid of those awful flat caps?” he asks, and is rewarded with a dry look from Illya. “It’s for the good of New York,” he argues. “People might get the wrong impression of the city if they see you wandering around with that hideous affront to fashion on your head.”

“If that’s your concern, Cowboy, then I should get rid of half your suits,” Illya replies, just to see Napoleon’s reaction. He can’t help but laugh at Napoleon’s immediate protests.

There’s still a tense undercurrent in the house, seeing as they are on the run from the KGB, but now they can defuse it by making out on the couch until Illya’s ribs protest too much. Napoleon has to go out into town to make sure they actually have food for dinner, but mollifies Illya by bringing back a _tarte tatin_ for him. Nothing happens on the security cameras, and by the evening the undercurrent quietens down to a mere murmur.

Napoleon resets the chess board with a grin after dinner, handing Illya a glass of wine. “Try not to defeat me so badly this time,” he says with a grin.

“Oh?” Illya asks. “And what do I get for showing…restraint?”

Napoleon’s wicked grin is answer enough, and Illya draws the game out for a full hour, moves interspersed with easy conversation. At one point talk turns to UNCLE, and Illya mentions how he thinks they should recruit air stewardesses for their acting skills, and Napoleon laughs.

“Somehow I don’t think they would join if we gave them the welcoming talk we had,” Napoleon says. “Join UNCLE, they said. Travel the world. Get to see dungeons and torture chambers on all seven continents.”

Illya snorts in amusement. “Six,” he replies. “I don’t think even the worst people we’ve encountered would be insane enough to set up torture chambers in Antarctica.”

“It’s only a matter of time,” Napoleon says with a grin. “I’m sure you’ll cope with the weather there, anyway. It’ll be just like home.”

“I hated Siberia,” Illya mutters. “It’s fucking freezing, as you like to say about any weather that’s colder than an English winter.”

Napoleon stares at him for a moment, and then bursts out laughing. “That has got to be the most unpatriotic thing I’ve ever heard you say,” he says with a grin. He laughs again to himself, and studies the chess board. “Fucking freezing,” he mutters in a poor imitation of Illya’s accent. “I want to carve those words onto a plaque and hang them in your apartment. I think it’s the only time you’ll ever say them.”

“Careful, Cowboy,” Illya warns. “I could destroy you in two moves if I wanted to.” That sets them back to the game in front of them. Illya restrains himself from destroying Napoleon and taking his king for another fifteen minutes, but eventually even Napoleon has to admit he’s outmatched. He sighs, and tips his king over.

“You held off from defeating me for over an hour,” he says, getting up from the armchair and walking towards Illya, a slow grin spreading across his face. Illya leans back on the couch, looking up at Napoleon as he stands between his legs and then straddles him, tracing Illya’s jawline with his fingers.

Illya grins, and grasps Napoleon’s waist. “I have a few ideas with how you can make it worth my time,” he says, and his grin widens when Napoleon shudders in his grasp. He reaches up and pulls him down to kiss him.

It’s as they’re stumbling into the bedroom, trying to undress each other and not let each other go whilst doing it, that Napoleon suddenly stumbles with a wince and a muffled curse. “What the hell?” he asks, looking down at Illya’s jacket that he’d just stepped on, knocked from the nearby chair. “What’s in your jacket? Please don’t say you’ve hidden another knife in the lining and I’ve just stabbed myself with it.”

Illya frowns and picks up the jacket, feeling through the pockets. He pulls out a small cassette tape, and Napoleon’s frown only deepens. “Why do you have that?” he asks.

Illya turns it over in his hands. “Gaby gave it,” he says. “Night of argument.” In everything that had happened afterwards, he’d forgotten that he’d slipped it into one of his jacket pockets. He hands it to Napoleon. “She said it was recording of something you said, in Medical when I was unconscious. Said I should listen to it.”

Napoleon looks confused for a second, and then understanding dawns on his face. A moment later, he shutters his expression. Illya crosses to him, gently tilting his chin up.

“I haven’t listened to it,” he says intently. “I wasn’t going to without asking you first. Whatever you said, you didn’t intend for me to hear.” He pauses for a moment. “In fact, I should have done this as soon as she gave it to me.” He plucks the tape from Napoleon’s hands, and then disappears into the bathroom. Bewildered, Napoleon follows him.

Illya unspools the reels and dumps them in the sink. Napoleon watches as he pulls out a box of matches and lights one, and then carefully sets the reels on fire. The tape burns quickly, and Illya washes the ashes down the sink.

“What was that for?” Napoleon asks once the tap shuts off. Illya turns to him, and takes his face in his hands, smoothing one thumb across his cheek.

“If you want me to know what you said, you tell me,” he says simply. “But I won’t hold whatever that is over you.” They have little privacy as spies, and he won’t take any away from Napoleon if he can help it, nor keep potential blackmail material on him like that.

Napoleon smiles, and drags Illya in for a bruising kiss. “I really don’t deserve you,” he mutters against Illya’s lips, and Illya shakes his head.

“You do,” he says helplessly, pushing Napoleon back into the bedroom as he pulls off his shirt. “You do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're getting vaguely close to the end, but I have other works in progress, and though uni is slowly crushing me with work (and I was thrown from a horse on Sunday and had said horse fall on me as it fell, so I'm pretty beaten up and sore at the moment) I'm chipping away at the Tour de France AU, and have others being planned. I'm not going anywhere!
> 
> Oh, I've finally remembered to say this- [this is my tumblr](https://theheirofashandfire.tumblr.com/) (though my blog is a complete mess that I don't look after in the slightest, I don't even tag anything, so enter at your own risk). Feel free to pop on over if you want to drop me prompts or anything.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're slowly approaching the end in a mildly meandering way, because this story was so much fun to write and I didn't want to let it go.  
> For all those who have expressed their worry after my fall- I'm okay! Seeing a physio tomorrow because the leg isn't healing as quickly as it should be, but I'm alright. Thanks for all your well-wishes.  
> More domestic fluff here, as if I haven't been spoon feeding it to you for half this story.

At first, Illya doesn’t know what has woken him. The room is dark, but it’s a soft darkness that is easy to breathe in. Illya briefly wonders if he’s being too elaborate, but he supposes that after all the years spent working in the various shadows of the world, he would be qualified to know what darkness is like.

There’s a warm weight against his side, and his arm is going to sleep trapped beneath Napoleon. Illya shifts slightly, trying to work out why he’s awake, and then he hears a soft murmur from Napoleon. He stills, almost holding his breath, and waits.

Napoleon shifts slightly in his sleep, a soft whimper slipping past his lips. He rolls away from Illya, one hand scrabbling across the bed as if searching for something. Illya knows him, has seen him in the midst of nightmares before, and he knows that Napoleon doesn’t often shout himself awake. He’ll start like this, usually, and then will move about more and more until he finally wakes himself up. Once or twice Illya has rushed into the room to find Napoleon has flung himself off the bed whilst asleep, only waking when he hits the floor.

Napoleon whimpers again and struggles briefly against the sheets pooling around his waist. Illya sighs and reaches for him, ignoring the ache in his ribs as he twists.

“Cowboy,” he says softly. “Is only dream. Wake up.” He reaches out for Napoleon and then hesitates. He doesn’t know the best way to wake Napoleon now. Napoleon never wakes him by grabbing hold of him; there’s a gouge in Napoleon’s kitchen table that’s enough reason for that one. And Illya knows that Napoleon is just as dangerous, even if he hides it beneath suits and an infuriating accent.

Napoleon murmurs something that Illya thinks is in French, and twists so he’s half on his front. Illya props himself up on one elbow, and gently pushes against Napoleon’s shoulder. “Cowboy,” he says softly. “Napoleon. Come on, is only dream.” He runs his hand down Napoleon’s side. “Wake up now, Cowboy.”

Napoleon just mutters Illya’s name, followed by a string of mostly unintelligible words as he twists again. Illya sighs and gives in. He reaches over and shakes Napoleon’s shoulder. “Cowboy.”

Napoleon goes from asleep to alert in an instant, gasping for breath as he hauls himself to sit up on the bed. Illya pauses, one hand outstretched towards him. “Napoleon?”

Napoleon glances over at him, his face just visible in the darkness. “Oh good,” he says humourlessly. “You’re not dead.”

Illya watches him cautiously as he heaves a breath and then swings his legs over the edge of the bed. He looks like he’s on the verge of getting up but he never does, just sits there with his head bowed, heaving in breaths. “Napoleon,” Illya says softly, and then he shifts over so he’s hovering next to him. His hand is outstretched, but not touching, and there’s an inch of space and an ocean between them.

Napoleon closes the distance effortlessly when he sighs, and leans back against Illya. “You’re still not dead,” he murmurs, and Illya wraps his arms around him.

“Afraid not, Cowboy,” Illya murmurs, but the joke falls flat and Napoleon’s breath hitches. Illya frowns, and pulls Napoleon back onto the bed. Napoleon goes willingly, and lets Illya pull him into a tight embrace. He presses his face into Illya’s shoulder, and Illya doesn’t say anything when he feels Napoleon’s chin quiver.

Eventually Napoleon quiets, and pulls back enough to look up at Illya. “Sorry,” he mutters. Illya shakes his head, and presses a soft kiss to his lips.

“Nothing to be sorry about,” he says, remembering the night he’d been throwing up, the dreams were so bad, and Napoleon had sat up with him late into the night, a solid presence by his side the whole time. “At least you are not throwing up with broken ribs.”

Napoleon huffs the barest of laughs, and then reaches past Illya for the lamp. He winces at the sudden light, and buries his face in Illya’s shoulder. Illya smiles, and runs his hand through Napoleon’s hair so he can tease the curls at the nape of his neck.

“You have an unhealthy obsession with my hair,” Napoleon mutters into Illya’s shoulder.

Illya smirks, and tugs slightly on one of the curls. “It’s beautiful,” he says softly. “Like you.” Napoleon huffs a laugh, but doesn’t say anything. “What was the dream?” Illya asks. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” he adds as soon as Napoleon hesitates.

Napoleon shrugs, and pulls back enough so he can sit up against the headboard. “The usual,” he says. “Or at least the usual for these past weeks. You died.” His voice is subdued and quiet, swallowed by the shadows cast in the light of the lamp, and Illya can’t stand it. He straddles Napoleon, quietly revelling in the fact that he can do that now, and presses kisses across Napoleon’s face.

“I’m okay,” he says softly. “I’m alive. It takes more than Sanders to kill me.” He knows he cannot promise that he’ll never be killed, he knows that they could die at any point in this line of work, so he doesn’t promise that. Napoleon looks up and captures his lips, and for a few minutes there’s little but soft gasps that fill the room.

Napoleon pulls back, eventually, and runs his hands down Illya’s sides. “You know that tape,” he murmurs, and Illya sits back with a nod. Napoleon smiles crookedly. “I don’t remember what I said, word for word,” he admits. “I was running on caffeine and not much else, and it was just after you’d come out of the second surgery, so my head was nowhere near the right space.”

Illya hums, but doesn’t say anything. His leg is starting to ache where the stitches were, so he moves to sit next to Napoleon, one arm around his shoulders and pulling him close. Napoleon leans into him. “I said some things about running from the war, and how spies live too long and become sour,” Napoleon says with the hint of a wry smile. “But the main thing, I suppose…” He trails off, and Illya tugs him closer. Napoleon looks up at Illya, a soft smile curving his lips.

“It’s easier with you,” he says. “This whole damn game, or war, or whatever you want to call it, it’s so much easier with you by my side.”

Illya is silent for a moment, long enough that Napoleon looks up at him with a flash of concern. Illya shakes his head at the worried look he’s trying to keep off his face. “I feel the same,” he says simply. “I think I am less of coward, when you are here.”

Napoleon scoffs. “You’re the bravest person I know,” he says. “Apart from maybe Gaby, but then she’s so far above us all it’s not even funny.” Illya hums in agreement, stroking his fingers through Napoleon’s hair.

“Do you think Gaby can get me out of this?” Illya asks, his voice a low rasp.

Napoleon glances up at him. “She’s Gaby,” he says. “And Waverly is on this as well.” He sighs slightly. “Waverly is far from perfect, but I think he’s the best we’re going to get in this game. He’ll do his best.” Illya hesitates. “I’m with you in this for as long as you’ll have me,” Napoleon adds. “We stand a much better chance of getting out of this mess together.”

Illya sounds tired when he next speaks. “And what if Waverly can’t get me out of this?” he mutters. “What do we do then?”

Napoleon hesitates, and then reaches for Illya’s hand. He laces his fingers with Illya’s, and there’s a sudden rush when Illya looks over at him and the corners of his lips curl in a smile. “We’ll deal with that if it happens,” he says, squeezing Illya’s hand. “But if it does, I have safehouses all around the world. Hell, we can go and build ourselves completely new identities and lives anywhere you want to.”

Illya glances at Napoleon, eyes wide. “You’d do that?” he asks softly. “Come with me?”

“For as long as you’ll have me,” Napoleon promises. Illya presses a kiss to his temple, and Napoleon settles back into his embrace.

For a few minutes they just sit there together, but eventually Illya stifles a yawn. “Want to turn out the light, Cowboy?” he asks.

Napoleon hesitates, the fragments of the dream still haunting him, and that’s all the answer Illya needs. “Want me to keep talking?” he asks next. Napoleon nods, and Illya hums. “What was the book you read to me, that night?” he asks.

“Fahrenheit 451,” Napoleon says after thinking about it for a few moments. “I don’t think it was banned in the Soviet Union, but I doubt it would have been popular, seeing as one of the main themes is about state-based censorship. It’s a dystopian novel where books are banned, and firefighters actually burn books. The main character is a firefighter, but starts to keep a few books and begins questioning the regime.”

Illya hums. “How does it end?”

Napoleon has to think about it for a few moments. “The city is destroyed with nuclear weapons,” he says eventually. “The protagonist has already escaped and found the beginnings of the revolution, exiles who have memorised books so that, if society collapses, they can begin to rebuild it whilst remembering the literature of the past. It ends with one of the exiles telling the protagonist about the mythical creature the phoenix, how it endlessly dies and is reborn, and how humans could be better because we can remember our mistakes. And then the exiles start to go back to the city to rebuild society.”

Illya hums softly. “They’d all die of radiation sickness,” he points out, and Napoleon huffs a laugh.

“Ever the pragmatist,” he says with a grin. “That’s besides the point, and anyway, I do like it. I like the idea of a quiet revolution. The people fighting against the regime aren’t soldiers, they don’t have guns. They just remember the words that people wrote down centuries ago.” He shrugs. “The book is meant to be a dystopia, but I’ve always seen it as a little idealistic. A bit of comfort doesn’t harm anyone, though.”

“No,” Illya muses. “I suppose it doesn’t.” He looks around at the bookshelves in the bedroom, and then at the small stack of books on the bedside table. “Pass me one of those books.”

Napoleon reaches over and picks out one of them. Illya glances at the spine of the book. “Tennyson, Cowboy? A little idealistic again?”

“Why not?” Napoleon asks, settling back against Illya. “I like his interpretations of the Arthurian legends, especially Gareth and Lynette. Besides, he wasn’t idealistic at all. Look up _Tears, Idle Tears_ at some point, and you’ll see what I mean.” He huffs a brief laugh. “Though, I suppose any Western author would appear idealistic compared to your Russian ones.” Illya rolls his eyes, and Napoleon nudges him. “Read something to me?”

“So demanding,” Illya mutters, but he flicks through the book until he finds something he thinks Napoleon will like. “ _But were I loved, as I desire to be,”_ he begins, his voice a low rasp in the quiet shadows of the room as Napoleon settles against him and closes his eyes. “ _What is there in the great sphere of the earth/and range of evil between death and birth/that I should fear- if I were loved by thee?”_

0-o-0-o-0

They’re sitting at the kitchen table, bickering over the best way to cook potatoes- Napoleon favours dauphinoise, of course, whereas Illya likes potato pampushki, fried potato cakes with a melted cheese filling- when the phone rings. They both fall silent, and Illya swallows his comment about capitalist decadence as Napoleon gets up and picks up the phone.

“Hello?” he asks, and Illya can’t help it when his hands begin to shake. Napoleon is listening intently, and then out of nowhere a grin breaks out across his face. He gestures for Illya to come over, holding out a hand and pulling him close as soon as he’s within distance.

“We’ll see you soon,” he says into the phone, and he barely gives himself enough time to put it back in its cradle before turning to Illya and taking his hands, pulling him close.

“We’re going home,” he says, and Illya just stares at him. Napoleon tugs on his hands, and then wraps them around his own waist. “We’re going home,” he repeats, and slowly the enormity of it settles on Illya.

“Waverly got me out?” he asks, trying to stop his voice from trembling. Napoleon reaches up and cups his face, runs his thumb over the scar at the corner of his eye.

“He got you out,” he replies, his voice softening. “Illya, he got you out. You haven’t had to defect either, you’re still a Soviet citizen.” He laughs softly. “I wouldn’t try going back anytime soon, but you’re still Russian, they didn’t even get to take that away from you.” He smiles again, and Illya can’t help but smile back.

“I love you,” he says softly, and Napoleon’s face is the most beautiful thing he thinks he’s ever seen when he says it. “You know that, right? You’re…you’re my tether. You keep me grounded, you redeem me.”

Napoleon’s smile is blinding, and he tilts Illya’s head down so he can press kisses all over his face. “I love you too,” he murmurs. “You keep me brave.”

Illya huffs a laugh, and draws Napoleon in for a kiss. “We should pack,” he murmurs against Napoleon’s lips.

Napoleon sighs, and then moans when Illya kisses his way down his neck. “I suppose we should,” he says, though he makes no move away from Illya. “We have to sort out the house as well.” Illya hums, and tightens his grip on Napoleon’s waist.

It’s hours before they actually start packing and preparing the house. Illya glares with distaste as he throws away all of the uneaten food. “It’s wasteful,” he says when Napoleon asks him why he’s pouting. “Should give it to neighbours or something.”

“Peril, the neighbours already have too much food and money, and too little sense to really know what to do with either,” Napoleon points out. “There’s nothing else we can do with it.” Illya curls his lips, but throws it out.

As he’s heading for the stairs, he catches Napoleon staring at the Renoir above the fireplace. “I don’t particularly want to put it away,” he says over his shoulder. “It’s just so beautiful, and I hate it sitting in a cellar.”

Illya comes up behind him and wraps his arms around Napoleon’s waist. “болтун,” he murmurs with a sly grin, pressing a kiss to Napoleon’s neck. “When we come back, we can hang it up in the bedroom.”

“When?” Napoleon asks, leaning back into Illya’s solid warmth. “We’re coming back?”

“Of course,” Illya says. “Perfect place for a holiday. If Waverly ever gives me time off ever again.”

Napoleon laughs. “I suppose it is,” he muses. “And you haven’t even properly seen the gardens yet.” He turns his head enough to kiss Illya. “Magpie?”

Illya shrugs. “Seems appropriate,” he says. “You do have an unnatural obsession with shiny things.”

“Not just shiny things,” Napoleon points out. He sighs, and reluctantly steps out of Illya’s grasp. “We really should finish packing and securing the house.” Illya sighs, but nods and lets Napoleon go.

They finalise plans for getting back to New York as they eat the last of the food in the fridge, briefcases sitting by their feet. Illya realises that he’s going to miss this house as he looks around. Napoleon doesn’t know, but he left one of his turtlenecks in the closet upstairs, and a knife stashed in the drawer of the bedside table. It’s a silent promise, to himself more than anyone else, that he’ll come back.

He kisses Napoleon for the last time in the doorway of the house, holding him close. Napoleon presses his forehead to Illya’s. “I love you, you know that,” he murmurs to him, and Illya nods.

“I love you too,” he says helplessly. “You know me. You keep me brave.”

Napoleon laughs. “And you say I’m the romantic,” he says. He sighs, and kisses Illya once again. “We should leave. We do have jobs to be getting back to.” They lock up and secure the house, checking the perimeter for a final time before they get in the car and drive away. Illya twists in his seat, watching the house disappear as they turn out of the drive and onto the road. Napoleon, immaculate in the first suit he’s put on in days, pomade in his hair and Italian sunglasses, glances over at Illya, and then reaches over to take his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of Napoleon being vulnerable there, as it was pretty much his turn for it now.
> 
> If you can read Farenheit 451, please do. It really stuck with me because of the way it ends, because it's not soldiers fighting in a great war. The revolution is quiet, it's people remembering books because stories are what societies are built on, and it's a hauntingly hopeful ending. Tennyson is going to crop up again as well- this is what happens when you have a sister doing an English Literature degree at a fancy university, you absorb such knowledge by osmosis.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're nearing the end now, in a roundabout sort of way. There will probably be two chapters after this one, one of which will just be a short epilogue.

They leave the car in a storage space that Napoleon buys on the spot, reluctant to part with the car, and take separate taxis to the airport. Illya is itching to look for Napoleon, to go to him when he sees a familiar figure through the crowds. Napoleon seems to be feeling the same, because he almost sits down in the seat next to Illya’s on the plane before seemingly coming to his senses, and reluctantly walking away.

They fly to Canada again, on the fake passports, and then take another plane into New York. Illya is nervously tapping his fingers against his arm the entire taxi journey back, and Napoleon longs to take his hand. He does, just for the briefest of moments, as they get out in front of the building. There’s a familiar figure waiting just outside.

Illya staggers under the weight of Gaby throwing herself at him. “Hello to you too, Chop Shop Girl,” he says with a fond smile, and Gaby grins.

“Oh, it’s good to have you back,” she says, pressing a kiss to his cheek, and then to Napoleon’s as he comes up to them. “Waverly wants to see the both of you right away.”

“Of course he does,” Napoleon says with a sigh. “How much trouble are we in?”

Gaby gives him a look. “Waverly was the one to arrange your passports and the cash that got you out of here,” she says, leading them through the hallways of headquarters and into an elevator. “So you’re only in a little bit of trouble, and it’s mainly Solo for dropping everything and running with you, Illya.”

Napoleon scoffs. “We stood a much better chance together,” he says, nudging Illya and giving him a fond look. Illya blushes, and there’s a small noise of surprise from Gaby.

“Oh!” she exclaims, and then claps her hands together in glee. “Glad to see you two worked it out.” She links her arm with Illya. “Does this mean you’re going to both be causing fewer headaches for me then?”

Illya huffs a dry laugh, and Napoleon just shakes his head with a wry grin. “Cowboy is going to be more infuriating than ever,” Illya says as they step out of the elevator.

“Slander and lies, Peril,” Napoleon says. “Nothing but slander and lies.” Illya gives him a look and Napoleon’s expression softens slightly. He leans into Illya slightly as they’re walking, their fingers tangling together. There’s a smile on Gaby’s lips, and she’s about to say something when the door to Waverly’s office opens.

“Welcome back, boys,” Deena says with a smile, a stack of files in her hands. Despite it being long past midnight, she looks wide awake and perfectly put together as usual. “You can go straight in,” she says. “He’s expecting the two of you.”

“And that is my cue to leave,” Gaby says with a wink at Deena. “My bed is calling to me.” She presses kisses to Napoleon and Illya’s cheeks, and gives them a last fond look before she disappears down the hallway.

Deena ushers them through into Waverly’s office, and Napoleon feels a brief pang of jealousy when he sees Waverly perfectly put together, sitting behind his desk with a cup of tea and a file open in front of him. “Ah, Kuryakin and Solo,” he says as they enter. “Thank you, Deena. Sit down, please.”

Illya sinks into one of the chairs in front of Waverly’s desk, Napoleon doing the same next to him. “Sir,” he says, his voice suddenly sticking in his throat.

Waverly steeples his fingers under his chin, and gives Illya a look over the top of his glasses. “Technically, Kuryakin,” he begins with. “You are still a KGB agent.” Illya stiffens, and he can see Napoleon suddenly looking alarmed out of the corner of his eye. Waverly holds up a hand, stopping Napoleon from saying anything.

“In name only,” he clarifies. “You are still a Soviet citizen, and to ensure you remained as such your name is still under the KGB. However, you are now a full UNCLE agent. The KGB cannot touch you without my permission.” Waverly leans back in his chair, the first signs of weariness appearing in the lines in his face. “This was one of the more difficult extractions of an agent from their loan agency, I must admit,” he says with a sigh. “The KGB were not happy about losing you, Kuryakin.”

Illya nods. “I understand,” he says. “Thank you,” he adds, his voice thick. “I owe you.” Napoleon glances at him, and Illya forces himself not to reach out for him, accept the comfort that he can see Napoleon is itching to offer.

Waverly waves one hand. “Nothing I wouldn’t do for one of my top agents,” he says. “You can repay me by doing your job effectively.” He turns his attention on Napoleon.

“Your case is a little more difficult,” he says. “The CIA is very reluctant to even guarantee that you serve the rest of your prison sentence out with UNCLE. We are continuing to try and leverage an agreement with Sanders based on the evidence we have against him, but he is very good at finding loopholes in the law, and our evidence is circumstantial enough that it will not hold up in court.”

“What are you saying, Sir?” Napoleon asks, his voice eerily quiet.

Waverly sighs, and leans forward to rest his elbows on the desk. “I’m saying that I had to divert effort and resources into making sure Kuryakin didn’t get snatched away and put into an early grave by the KGB,” he says frankly. “For now, there is not much more I can do to try and get you away from the CIA.”

“Sir,” Illya says, his voice strangled. Next to him, Napoleon is silent. “Sir, you can’t-”

“There is nothing _I_ can do,” Waverly says slowly, looking intently at the both of them. “I hope you understand that.”

Illya goes to protest again, but Napoleon reaches out and lays a hand on his arm. “Understood, Sir,” he says, and he looks like he’s thinking hard. Illya sends him a questioning look, and Napoleon shakes his head slightly, a silent request for Illya to leave it alone and trust him.

Illya settles back into his chair with a nod at Napoleon. “I assume I must sign something.”

“Ah, yes,” Waverly says, pulling out a sheaf of papers. “Here’s your new contract. Four years of service, if you would, and then after that you are free to go where you please. If you wish to defect at any point, that is another matter entirely. I doubt the American government would sponsor your defection after all this, but I could convince the British to sponsor you, or the French.”

Illya shakes his head. “For another time,” he says, flipping through the contract. “Napoleon and I still work together, yes?”

“But of course,” Waverly replies, looking mildly surprised at the question. “I wouldn’t split up my most promising partnership and some of my top agents for anything, even if you can be a little unorthodox sometimes, and more infuriating than I would like.” He takes a sip of his tea, and then sets the cup down in the saucer. “If that’s all satisfactory with you, Kuryakin, then just sign on the last page.”

Illya nods, and picks up a pen to sign. “Very good,” Waverly says, and he does sound pleased as he takes the contract back. “Now, seeing as it is nearly two in the morning, and you have been travelling all day, I’ll give you the day off. Unpack, relax and I’ll see you back here on what is technically now tomorrow.”

Illya and Napoleon get to their feet, Illya wincing slightly as his ribs and leg still protest. Waverly picks up another file on his desk, and Napoleon arches a brow. “Do you ever sleep, Sir?” he asks.

Waverly hums. “I am British, Solo,” he says. “We consider sleep an unfortunate hindrance that can be avoided with enough tea. Now, don’t let me detain the two of you.”

Napoleon inclines his head and lets that go, and they leave the office. Deena gives them a warm smile from her desk. “Oh, Solo?” she asks, and Napoleon pauses in the doorway. Deena holds out a thin manila folder for him. “Friends came through,” is all she says. Napoleon takes the folder and reads through the first page, and a slow smile spreads across his face.

“Thanks Deena,” he says. “I owe you one.”

Deena shrugs. “I’ll take opera tickets,” she says. “Now get going, you two, before you get stuck here.”

They get halfway down the hallway before Illya reaches the limits of his patience, and is reaching for the folder. “What is this?” he asks, flicking through the paper inside.

“Ammunition,” Napoleon says with a grin. “Not enough as I would have hoped for, but enough for a good start.” Illya frowns, and takes a few moments to actually read one of the pages.

“This is on Sanders,” he says eventually, realisation dawning on his face. “Is this why-”

“I asked you to keep quiet, when Waverly said he couldn’t do anything?” Napoleon asks. “Yes, this is why. I think Waverly was giving us as much permission as he could to go after this on our own.”

Illya nods, and thinks for a few moments. “I have contacts,” he says eventually. “Old friends, older than the KGB. They can help.” He’s already running through lists of his contacts in his head, striking off those who were dead or useless for whatever reason. Many of them will probably be wary of him, once word gets out of what happens, but he knows people who will believe him over the KGB, and he can use that to his advantage.

Napoleon glances around, making sure they are alone, and then tangles his fingers with Illya’s. “Let’s not start anything tonight, though,” he says. “I don’t know about you, but I could use a good sleep and some home food.” He glances at Illya, and there’s a sudden uncertainty in his gaze. “Want to come back to my penthouse?”

“Of course,” Illya says instantly. “Bed is much more comfy.”

“Good,” Napoleon says, a soft smile curling his lips. They get a taxi back to the apartment, exhaustion creeping up on them with little warning now that they are finally safe. Illya slumps back in the taxi, and Napoleon repeatedly nudges him to keep him awake.

“Nearly there,” he murmurs when the taxi finally pulls over outside the Met. It’s closed, at two in the morning, but even the familiar architecture of it, the outside lights shining soft yellow in the darkness, makes Napoleon’s lips curl in a smile. Illya huffs a brief laugh, and brushes past him.

“болтун,” he mutters, and Napoleon laughs softly, the sound slowly fading into the New York night. They head up to the penthouse, Illya leaning more against Napoleon as the elevator goes up. “Tired,” he mutters when Napoleon gives him a concerned glance. “Leg is hurting.”

Napoleon frowns. “I think you’ve probably been walking on it too much,” he suggests as they step out of the elevator and head for the front door to the apartment. “Medical is going to kill you for missing a week of physical therapy.”

Illya grunt something unintelligible, which might have been in Russian. Napoleon disables the various security measures and gets them into the apartment, and Illya slumps down onto the couch. “Come on, let’s get to bed,” Napoleon says, locking the door behind him and wandering over to Illya. “That can’t be comfortable.”

Illya groans, but pulls himself up and stumbles into the bedroom, his limp far more noticeable now in his tiredness. Napoleon follows him, and they get ready for bed in a comfortable silence, Illya pulling on one of Napoleon’s shirts that’s just a little too tight for him and a pair of pyjama pants that he’d accidentally left in the apartment. It seems both like months and only hours since he was last here, asleep in this bed.

Napoleon climbs in, and Illya follows him. He can’t do anything else. He doesn’t want to do anything else.

Illya rolls over, and Napoleon wraps an arm around him to pull him close. “Go to sleep,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss to Illya’s neck. “I’ll be here when you wake up. I promise.”

“We are spies,” Illya mutters, already half asleep. “We should not promise anything.”

“Well you’re always telling me how much of a terrible spy I am, so that doesn’t matter,” Napoleon says lightly. He traces his fingers down Illya’s arm. “I won’t ever promise you something I can’t keep.”

“Me neither,” Illya murmurs. He clutches at Napoleon’s hand briefly. “Night, Cowboy.”

“Night, Peril,” Napoleon mumbles sleepily. They fall asleep together, and it feels like coming home.

0-o-0-o-0

The little bell rings as Napoleon pushes the door open, and Illya breathes in the smell of spices and fresh bread that has permeated the air inside the delicatessen. There’s an elderly woman behind the counter, who harrumphs as soon as she see them.

“I don’t like you disappearing on me like that,” she chides Napoleon, and Illya is delighted to see Napoleon actually look chagrined.

“You know how business can be sometimes,” he says apologetically. “If I had known I would have to be out of the country, I would have said.” The woman makes a disapproving noise, and her attention turns to Illya. “Ah, this is Illya,” Napoleon says, ushering him forwards. “Illya, this is Malka.” He turns to her. “Illya is the friend I mentioned, the one that was staying with me to get back on his feet.”

“Ah yes, of course,” Malka says. She beckons Illya over, taking his hand. “Hit by a car, yes? Sit down here.” She pats the counter, and Illya pulls out a stool and sits down. Malka looks satisfied. “You should keep yourself rested, yes? Not let him drag you around this city.”

Illya huffs a laugh, glancing at Napoleon. He holds his hands up. “I can tell you two are going to gang up on me,” Napoleon says. “I’m going to get what we need for supper, and leave you two to gossip.” Malka gives him a smile, and Napoleon wanders off.

“So,” she says, fixing Illya with a sharp gaze. “Hit by a car?” She takes Illya’s hand and turns it over, fingers tracing the gun calluses there. Illya watches carefully as she laughs softly to herself. “He thinks I don’t know what he really does,” she says to Illya, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. “Like I can’t tell what you boys are. I may be old, but my memory is still sharp, and my eyes are sharper still.”

Illya studies her for a long moment, and then arches a brow. “You were one of us?” he asks. She hides it well, he thinks, and he wonders just what her story is.

Malka waves a hand. “Oh, I just dabbled a bit during the war,” she tells him. “Resistance, and all that. I never made a career out of it like the two of you. Didn’t have the chance, really.” She rolls up her sleeves, and Illya sees the numbers inked along her arm. Malka looks down at it, rubbing her thumb over the marks. “I managed five years with the _Armia Krajowa,_ but was caught when trying to sneak into Warsaw before the uprising. Didn’t really feel like going back to it once the war was over.”

Illya winces at that. “I am sorry,” he says, switching into Polish. Malka’s face lights up, and she answers in the same language.

“Oh, don’t be,” she says, waving a hand. “It happened. Other things are more important.” She leans on the counter, and studies him. “I’m assuming that you’re not a Soviet spy here to kill us all, seeing as he couldn’t be anything other than American. Besides, we were on the same side in the war.” Illya huffs a laugh, nodding, and Malka looks pleased with herself. “So,” she asks, leaning on the counter. “What really happened to you?”

“Building was blown up,” Illya says with a grimace. “Napoleon saved my life.” Malka’s expression softens, and she glances up to where Napoleon is still browsing the shelves.

“I’ve seen that look before,” she says, as Illya turns to look at him. “The one on your face right now.” Illya can feel the hammering of his heart, but he keeps his face blank. Malka clucks at him. “You poor boy,” she says. “Afraid of who you love. It really doesn’t matter to me, even if it does to the rest of the world. I’ve seen enough die because someone decided they weren’t worth enough.”

Illya ducks his head, and Malka briefly touches his hand. “Does he love you back?” she asks.

Illya just nods, turning to look at Napoleon as he picks out a cut of salami. Napoleon briefly looks up, catching Illya’s gaze, and offers him a soft smile. Malka sighs in relief. “Well, that helps,” she says to him. “Keep hold of him, will you? He’s a good one.”

“I know he is,” Illya says softly. “Better than I deserve.”

Malka gives him a disapproving look. “If I’m right, which I usually am, you two deserve each other just right,” she says firmly. “Now I’ll hear no more nonsense from you about that.” She reaches behind the counter and pulls out a plate of biscuits. “Eat one.”

“I’m fine,” Illya says, but Malka fixes him with a look, and he takes a biscuit from the plate.

Napoleon wanders over. “Ah, I see Malka is trying to feed you up,” he says with a grin, putting down an armful of shopping on the counter. “Am I not good enough?”

Illya swats at him. “You don’t make biscuits,” he says, and just to be petty he takes another. Napoleon attempts to glare at him, but there’s a laugh threatening to break through onto his face.

“I’m doing risotto for supper,” he says as Malka rings up his groceries. “That sound okay, Peril?”

Illya doesn’t miss the subtle look that Malka gives him. “That sounds good, Cowboy,” he replies. “When we get back, remind me to make those phone calls I need to.” Napoleon nods, resting his hand on Illya’s shoulder as he chats with Malka. His thumb gently smooths over the back of Illya’s neck, and Illya leans into the touch a little.

“ _Do zobaczenia później_ ,” Illya says as he helps Napoleon carry the groceries out, and Malka’s answering smile reminds him, suddenly, of his mother.

“You two seem to get on,” Napoleon remarks as they’re heading down the street back to the apartment. “Was that Polish you switched into?” At Illya’s nod, he arches a brow. “What were you two gossiping about?”

Illya just laughs, and shakes his head. “You’re a terrible spy, Cowboy,” is all he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've had a crappy day or two recently- been freaking out over university things and whether I should move halfway around the world for a year (I've decided not to, I have too much tying me here at home and I don't have to prove anything by going off to Australia for a year, I'll have other opportunities later in life when I'm ready to do that) but anyway, writing always helps to calm me down somewhat, so here's another chapter.  
> The Tour de France AU is slowly getting finished, by the way- I've just gotten to the angsty bit and it's being great fun to write!


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the last real chapter! There will be a short epilogue going up in the next few days, but this is pretty much the last of the plot, and we finally get to deal with something that has been a problem since the very beginning of this series.  
> Enjoy. I had a lot of fun writing the latter half of this chapter.

Napoleon stirs the risotto, and tries not to listen in on Illya’s conversation. Once they’d gotten back to the apartment he’d picked up Napoleon’s phone and begun calling the contacts that he knew who might have blackmail material on Sanders. He’d been on the phone for hours, jotting down information on a notepad. Napoleon had tried to read it over his shoulder, but it was in Russian cursive. For all of Napoleon’s skills, he still thinks Russian cursive is just doodles.

“ _Da,_ ” Illya says into the phone. He’d been speaking Russian for a while now. Before that it had been what Napoleon thinks was Ukrainian, or possibly Polish. “I know.” He listens for a few moments, and then nods. Napoleon thinks he looks relieved. “Thank you,” he mutters. “No more favours.”

“Success?” Napoleon asks, leaving the risotto for a moment to lean against the kitchen doorway. Illya shrugs.

“Depends on definition,” he says, jotting something down on the notepad. “One more call to make, I think.”

“Well, don’t take too long,” Napoleon says. He wanders over and leans over Illya from behind the chair, wrapping his arms around him loosely. Illya tips his head back so Napoleon can press a kiss to his neck, and hums softly.

“Shouldn’t you be stirring the risotto?” he murmurs as Napoleon kisses his way down his neck, tugging at his shirt with one hand. “Not that I’m not enjoying this, but it’s going to burn.”

Napoleon groans, and straightens up. “Make your phone call,” he says. “I’ll have supper ready when you’re done.” Illya shoots him a grateful look, and dials another number.

“Natalia,” he says, and Napoleon listens into the one half of the conversation that he can hear as he stirs the risotto.

“ _C’est moi,_ ” Illya says. “ _On peut parler?_ ”

There’s a slight smile on his face as he listens to whoever Natalia is on the other end of the phone. “Don’t ask how I know you’re in Paris,” he says. “I know we called off favours between us long ago, but I need a favour, Natalia.” He pauses, listening for a few moments. “You’ll like this,” he replies to whatever she said. “I need information on the CIA handler Sanders. Blackmail information.”

Napoleon watches as Illya actually huffs a laugh, shaking his head. “I know, I told you,” he says. “No, it’s more complicated than that. A lot more complicated.” He pauses, listening again.

“Don’t tell me that, I know you’ll enjoy it,” he says, a smile quirking his lips. “You love blackmailing people.” He listens again for a few moments, and shakes his head. “I’m not in trouble, not anymore,” he tells her. “This is insurance. No, not for myself.” At that Napoleon glances up from the stove, and Illya catches his gaze. “It’s worth it,” he says into the phone, whilst staring at Napoleon. “It really is.”

Natalia is saying something, and Illya waits, doodling with the pen in his hand. “Yes, I’m sure you’ve heard rumours,” he says when she’s finished. “With what we are, there are always rumours.” He gets cut off, glaring at the wall opposite as he listens to her, and then jumps back in. “Yes, fine, I should have contacted you for help, but we got out of it on our own. Besides, I was slightly preoccupied with other things.”

Napoleon smirks. “Am I _other things_?” he asks quietly, and Illya gives him a dry look that only serves to widen Napoleon’s grin.

Something said on the other end of the phone gets his attention back. “I’m sure you’ve heard all about it through your usual channels,” he tells Natalia. “More reliable ones than the KGB. You know who I work for now. You know what we’re doing.”

He listens for a while. “The door is still there,” he says after a few minutes, his voice suddenly soft. “But I understand, Natalia. You know how to reach me.”

He glances up at Napoleon as he listens to something she says from the other end of the phone. “No, I know,” he says to her. “But…Natalia. I’m happy. I really am.” Napoleon’s expression softens, and he walks over and takes Illya’s hand, pressing a kiss to his knuckles. Illya smiles up at him, cradling the phone between his shoulder and ear to reach out with his other hand and trace Napoleon’s jaw. “If you’re ever in New York,” he says into the phone, and then Napoleon can hear the dial tone over the line.

“Who was that?” he asks, turning Illya’s hand over and pressing another kiss to the inside of his wrist.

“An old friend,” Illya says, tugging Napoleon down to him and running his hands through his hair. “Knew her from…well, we crossed paths when I was in spetsnaz, and then worked together in KGB. She’s…” He huffs a brief laugh. “She’s exceptional at what she does.”

“And what is that?” Napoleon asks.

Illya shrugs. “Whatever they need her to do,” he replies. “Give her a week, and we will have something to take Sanders down with. I’ve pulled favours with others, and they might come through as well.” He teases the curls at the nape of Napoleon’s neck. “We’ll have enough, together.”

Napoleon looks troubled for a brief moment, and Illya tugs at his hand until his legs fold and he’s kneeling at Illya’s feet. “What is it?” Illya asks.

Napoleon hesitates. “You don’t have to burn contacts for my vendetta,” he says eventually. “You shouldn’t have to. This doesn’t have anything to do with you, this is between me and the CIA, and I don’t know…” He trails off as he sees the look on Illya’s face. “I’m being stupid, aren’t I?”

“Of course, Cowboy,” Illya says. “They did try and kill me, so I think I get to choose if I help or not. Besides,” he adds, his expression softening, “you ran with me when the KGB came, you let me into your safehouse, you told me you would run with me across the world if it came to it. Getting you out of the CIA is the least I can do in return.”

Napoleon knows there is nothing but adoration on his face as he looks up at Illya, and Illya can’t help but smile. “Go finish risotto, Cowboy,” he says softly.

Napoleon kisses him again, and gets to his feet. “You know, you don’t even have to ever write in code,” he says as he looks at Illya’s notepad and the cursive Russian he’s jotted down. “It honestly just looks like you’ve spent the past few hours doodling.”

Illya uses the pad to swat at Napoleon. “Risotto, Cowboy,” he says. Napoleon laughs, and ruffles Illya’s hair on his way to the kitchen.

0-o-0-o-0

Sanders unlocks his office door, slipping off his coat and hat and hanging them up on the coatrack next to the door. He can feel the scotch in his private drinks cabinet calling to him, and he reaches over to switch on the light before turning for his desk. When he does turn, he freezes in his tracks.

Napoleon Solo is sat in front of him, leaning back in the chair with his feet up on the desk. “Sanders,” he drawls, a sharp smile curling his lips that doesn’t reach his eyes. “How lovely to see you.”

“Solo,” Sanders says, backing towards the door slightly. There is something in the look in his eyes that unnerves him and has his hand inching for his pistol. “What the hell are you doing here? How did you get into my office?”

“To answer the latter first,” Napoleon says, secretly enjoying the sudden wariness and confusion in his old boss’ face. “You really do need to tighten up your security here. As for the first question, well…” He reaches for a folder on the desk, flipping it open and skimming through the pages. “I have a few requests.”

“How many years of your prison sentence do you have left, Solo?” Sanders asks, coming to stand on the other side of the desk. Napoleon doesn’t even look up from the file in his hands. Over the past week they’ve managed to dig up a fair amount on Sanders, definitely enough for blackmail material, and even though he’s read through it countless times already, seeing the evidence on paper does still give him a little thrill.

“I believe it’s four,” he murmurs, selecting a piece of paper and putting it at the front of the file. “Are you going somewhere with that?”

“Remember that we own you,” Sanders says, and Napoleon can’t help but laugh at that.

“I’m sorry,” he says, a smirk on his lips. “I don’t think you do.”

Sanders steps forwards, but before he takes more than one step there’s the cold metal of a pistol pressing into his neck. Napoleon’s smirk widens. “I really wouldn’t,” he says. “Just stand there, and let’s have a chat.”

Sanders tries to look over his shoulder, but the gun digs into his skin and he stills. “I assume that’s your Russki there,” he says. “It’s a pity I didn’t manage to kill him with that building.”

Napoleon’s smirk turns brittle, and it takes most of his control to keep himself relaxed and leaning back in the chair. “Yes, I suppose if you had managed it, we wouldn’t be here right now,” he says, his voice cold. “It is a pity, but not, I think, in the way you mean.”

“What do you mean, Solo?” Sanders asks, and Napoleon tosses the file in his hands onto the desk.

“Let’s cut to the chase, shall we?” he asks as Sanders picks up the file and starts to look through it. “I still have plenty of friends in the CIA, people who are more powerful and important than you will ever be. And then there’s Jones in the US Marshals Service, who owes me a favour after that job in Oregon, and a few people in the FBI.” He smiles as he sees understanding slowly dawn on Sanders’ face. “I could take all this information straight to them, and you’d be arrested the next day.”

“So why don’t you?” Sanders asks, his voice firm even as his face pales slightly. Napoleon knows what’s in those pages, has spent the past week working on it with Illya at any chance they could get, and a little part of him is impressed at how steady Sanders is.

“Honestly?” Napoleon asks. “Because it’s much more fun to hang this over your head and see you squirm. I don’t think anyone at the CIA would take too kindly to knowing that you’re embezzling funds from operations in Latin America, or that you’re working with an agent in East Berlin to take money from people looking to cross the wall, never even getting them over that damn thing.” That was something Illya’s friend Natalia had informed them of, and between her and one of Illya’s contacts in Germany they had the evidence they needed. Napoleon’s information was subtler but no less damaging, whispers and rumours that he could, with a few words, send around the agency until Sanders was completely discredited.

Napoleon steeples his fingers, giving Illya a quick wink when Sanders is busy looking at the file, and waits for Sanders to look up. “I could just take all of this to your boss, or spread to my friends, but somehow I’m feeling a little generous.” Behind Sanders, the gun steady in his hand, Illya arches a brow and gives Napoleon an incredulous look.

“Okay, I’m really not,” Napoleon admits. “I always thought you were a complete bastard. But there’s a few things I want from you.” He picks up another file, this one a lot thinner, and puts it out on the desk. “Sign this, and I won’t ruin your entire career.”

“What is it?” Sanders asks, and just like that, Napoleon knows he has him.

“You are going to transfer me to UNCLE,” he explains. “Permanently. Tomorrow morning, someone will ring up Alexander Waverly and explain that the CIA has nullified my prison sentence in light of the duty I have completed for my country, and that I am no longer beholden to the CIA. I may work with the CIA again as part of UNCLE, I may even, god forbid, have to work with you at some point, but I will never be on your leash again.”

Sanders opens his mouth to protest, and the cold metal of the gun digs into his neck. “Sign the papers, please,” Napoleon says mildly. “I’d hate to get this office messy.”

“You’ll never get away with this,” Sanders spits at him, and Napoleon’s answering smile is sharp.

“I think I will,” he says. “See, I know you, Sanders. And I know you’re going to save your own skin over anything else. This is enough material to discredit you for the rest of your life. If you really want me to, I can get out some more, but I thought this would be enough for now.” There isn’t actually any more, but Napoleon isn’t going to tell him that.

“You fucking faggot,” Sanders snarls. “I’ll tell everyone about your Russki lover if you do this. I’ll tell everyone you’re a damn faggot and then nobody will ever work with you.”

Napoleon just arches his brow. “Well, then I’m sure everyone will love to hear how a faggot took you down,” he says, letting a slow smirk spreading across his face. “A fucking faggot and a Russki, isn’t that what you called us? Your reputation might survive that, but not if I throw in all of the juicy details we’ve uncovered as well.”

Sanders stills, and Napoleon stretches in his chair. “I’ll give that all a minute or two to sink in,” he says. “Let me know when you’ve internalised it all.” He smirks at Illya, who rolls his eyes from where he’s standing behind Sanders’ back. The gun doesn’t waver.

Eventually Sanders stirs, and reaches for a pen. “Slowly, please,” Napoleon says as Illya’s finger twitches on the trigger. “I wouldn’t want your head to get blown off before you sign this.” He watches, not without a stirring of relief, as Sanders signs the papers. Behind him Illya seems to relax slightly, giving Napoleon a nod.

“Shall I kill him now, Cowboy?” he asks.

Napoleon thinks he could die happy having seen the look on Sanders’ face as he hears those words. He shrugs, and pours himself a glass of scotch from Sanders’ private collection. “Up to you, Peril,” he says. “You’re the one he tried to kill, after all.”

“You knew him longer,” Illya points out. “Had to put up with him longer.” He presses the gun into Sanders neck, just so see him try not to flinch. “Your choice.”

Napoleon grins, slow and sharp. “You do know how to spoil me, Peril,” he says. He studies Sanders for a long moment, and then swings his legs off the desk. “You know, I must admit it is tempting,” he says, getting to his feet and sliding the papers off the desk as he walks around it. “I like to consider myself as not a violent person, or at least someone who doesn’t use violent methods unless it is necessary. For you, however, I find myself wanting to make an exception.”

Sanders visibly gulps, and Napoleon’s smile becomes even sharper. “It really is tempting,” he muses, taking a sip of his scotch. “But then being able to hold this over your head for years, knowing that you know I beat you…” He cocks his head, and shrugs. “I think that’s going to be a good feeling. What do you think, Peril?”

Illya steps around into Sanders field of view, looking at the man who tried to kill him. “I think I like the idea of seeing you bleed out on carpet,” he says quietly. “I think that would be a good feeling. But it is messy, and carpet looks expensive. Besides, Cowboy wants you alive.” He looks over at Napoleon, even though the gun doesn’t waver from Sanders’ head. “I think he should live the rest of his life knowing he is only here because we allow it,” he says, his voice quiet. “I think I like that idea too.”

He turns to Sanders, and pulls the trigger. The gun clicks.

“Bang,” Napoleon says with a smirk. He drinks the rest of his scotch, and then leans over and picks up the bottle. “I think I’ll take this,” he adds, walking around Sanders and plucking the file out of his hands. “Please don’t do anything stupid, Peril did just change that empty magazine for a full one.” There’s a click as Illya pushes the new magazine into place, and Napoleon, out of Sanders’ gaze, winks at him.

“Good talk,” Illya says as he heads towards the door. He glances at Napoleon. “Like it when they cower.”

Napoleon laughs, and doesn’t look back at Sanders as he shuts the door behind him. “I think that was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen you do,” he whispers to Illya as they walk out the building.

Illya looks at him, eyes dark and pupils blown. “If that’s the case,” he murmurs. “Then I’m not trying hard enough.”

It’s unbearably hard for either of them to keep their hands to themselves as they get a taxi back to the penthouse, and Illya crowds Napoleon up against the wall as soon as they step into the elevator, hot and demanding kisses that has Napoleon arching off the wall for more. They stumble down the hallway to the apartment door, and it takes Napoleon twice as long to unlock the door and disable the security systems with Illya behind him, sucking bruises onto his neck and collarbones.

They get inside and Napoleon shuts the door by turning and pushing Illya up against it. “Too many clothes,” he mutters against Illya’s lips, pushing at his jacket, and Illya pulls it off to let it fall to the floor. The shoulder holster comes next, the two of them stepping back from each other slightly to put the gun on a table, and then Napoleon pushes himself back against Illya, untucking his shirt and sliding his hands up against the hard muscle underneath.

Illya moans against Napoleon’s mouth and pushes his suit jacket off. “You’re beautiful,” he murmurs, pulling Napoleon close to him. Napoleon can’t help the smile that’s on his face, and he pushes Illya’s shirt up higher until Illya just pulls it off in one swift movement. Napoleon runs his hands over his chest, feeling the ridges of scar tissue, gunshots and stabs and burns that all only exist as a tapestry on his skin.

Once in bed, a trail of clothes leading into the room, Napoleon kisses every single scar on Illya’s body. He finishes with a trail of kisses up the most recent one, the scar from Illya’s surgery. “There isn’t a part of you I don’t love,” he murmurs, looking up at Illya from where he is straddling his thighs. “You can show me. All of it. I’m not scared.”

Illya pulls Napoleon down to him, drawing him into a fierce, passionate kiss. He runs his hands down Napoleon’s chest, over the scars he’s collected over the years. His fingers trace a starburst pattern of a gunshot wound on Napoleon’s side, silver in the light from the bedside lamp. “You can show me everything too,” he murmurs. “I won’t ever be afraid of you.”

Napoleon arches into his touch, and Illya groans at the contact. “I love you,” he says helplessly as Napoleon starts to move, and presses hot kisses to his neck and chest. “I love you.”

Napoleon moans, and clutches at Illya. “I love you too,” he says, his voice breathless. He captures Illya’s lips in a fierce kiss. “I won’t ever stop loving you,” he murmurs against Illya’s lips, and the look on Illya’s face at those words takes his breath away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Russian cursive really is that impossible to read. The scene with Sanders was a lot of fun to write, it felt very cathartic finally dealing with him after so long. And any guesses as to who Natalia is??
> 
> So the epilogue will probably be up some time next week? I've been in A&E (or the ER for you Americans) this weekend- I do a martial art and busted my ribs trying to get my next belt, but it's alright, we had a good time in the waiting room of A&E at 1am on Sunday trying to guess what had happened to the various drunk people who were also there. I'm dosed up on painkillers at the moment, which make me quite spaced out and feel pretty weird, so writing is a bit interesting at the moment! I can literally feel them kicking in as I write this, so yay.
> 
> I'm working on the two AUs I have going at the moment, even though the Tour de France AU does feel like it's snowballing slightly and getting out of control and OOC. And there's a shorter story that I have to put up in between, if I remember.
> 
> The painkillers are really kicking in now so I'm going to stop writing before I embarrass myself. Love you all.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we have finally reached the end.
> 
> It might be a good idea to pop back to the second chapter of the first story, [we cannot make our sun stand still (yet we will make him run)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11410608/chapters/25672302). Partly for the angst factor, and partly because what happens between Napoleon and Illya on that street, as Illya is dying, does have some bearing on this final chapter.
> 
> I'll save all the sappy thanks for the end notes.

Illya wakes up slowly. There’s a warm, solid body next to him and he shifts closer to it, pressing a sleepy kiss to the nearest skin he can reach. There’s a chuckle from the person next to him, and he cracks open his eyes as someone gently runs a hand through his hair.

“You’re finally awake,” Napoleon says, an amused smile curling his lips. He’s sat up in bed, sheets pooling around his waist and a book in his other hand. Illya groans slightly, and lets himself melt back against Napoleon.

“No, I’m not,” he mutters against Napoleon’s side. “Go away.”

Napoleon huffs a laugh, and trails his fingers down the back of Illya’s neck. “I can’t get over how little of a morning person you are,” he remarks. “It’s nearly nine, you know.”

“It’s our day off,” Illya mutters without opening his eyes. “We can stay in bed today.” He glances up at Napoleon, looking up at him through his lashes. “What are you reading?”

“Oh, Tennyson again,” Napoleon admits with a crooked smile. “This is the copy that I read during the war, and somehow kept safe all these years.” He turns the page, a nostalgic smile on his lips. “It may be clichéd, but I think this is my favourite work of Tennyson’s.”

“What is it?” Illya murmurs, tilting his head to try and read the title on the spine. Napoleon tilts the book for him, and he frowns. “ _In Memoriam_ ,” he reads out. “What is it about?”

“You know, Tennyson was probably gay,” Napoleon says instead of answering. “There’s no proof, as such, and academics will tie themselves in knots trying to convince themselves he wasn’t, but Tennyson wrote two hundred pages about the man that he knew, once he died, in memory of him.” He nods at the book in his hands. “You don’t do something like that without loving that person in some way.”

Illya nods. Their world is far more violent, and he knows he wouldn’t write poetry for Napoleon, but he will kill and bleed and die for him instead, sacrifice everything he can to keep him safe. Looking up at Napoleon, at the way his gaze softens as soon as he looks at him, he knows Napoleon will do the same for him without hesitation. It’s not poetry, but perhaps it’s the closest that the two of them can get.

“ _I hold it true, whate’er befall/I feel it when I sorrow most,”_ Napoleon reads in a soft voice, one hand resting on the back of Illya’s neck as he lies there and listens to him read. _“’Tis better to have loved and lost/than never to have loved at all._ ” He sighs slightly, and looks down at Illya. “True, I think,” he says softly. “To never have loved you would have been the greatest regret of my life.”

“And mine,” Illya murmurs. He yawns, stretching slightly and relishing the feeling that finally, everything is right. He knows that it won’t ever be perfect, that perfection is an illusion he unlearnt decades ago, but he thinks that this is close enough for him and Napoleon. The lives they live, the game they play, it could all be taken away in a moment. But he knows that, and he knows that he would rather have it all taken away tomorrow than never have it in the first place.

His eyes slip shut again, and Napoleon laughs, pushing at him slightly. “Hey,” he says softly. “Stay with me.”

Illya remembers those words, frantic and pleading as Napoleon knelt next to him amongst the rubble. He remembers struggling to breathe, and the regret that he was going to die, there on that street, without ever telling Napoleon how much he loves him. He remembers the words that had begged to spill from his lips, the ones that had been on his tongue but slipped away with the rest of him into the darkness, his name on Napoleon’s lips the last thing he heard.

Illya remembers he had wanted to say: _forever._

He had wanted to say: _for all the days you will have me, I am yours._

He had wanted to say: _yes._

This time, there’s nothing stopping him. He looks up at Napoleon, at the man he loves as the words beg once again to fall from his tongue, and he can’t help the smile on his lips as they finally do.

_finis_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the end. I have had the idea for this end, using those same words Illya had wanted to say to Napoleon when he was dying on the street, ever since first writing those words and the first story. It's strange to finally write and publish them.
> 
> I love you guys, you're all brilliant. Writing these stories has been so much fun, and I am so thankful to all of you who have read and left kudos and commented, especially those who have come back time and time again- PlanB, thewolvesrunwild, neroh, firexcape, Hsg, el3anorrigby and the others, you know who you are. Writing is always something that has to come from your own self, ultimately, but the reception from all of you has made it just brilliant. Coming from a fairly old and quiet fandom where I used to write, to jump headfirst into the trash of TMFU, has been great fun, and there's no way I'm leaving now.
> 
> I have two AUs in the work: a Tour de France AU which I have talked about before (which is reaching 50k and nowhere near done) and a modern AU where Napoleon has retired and is an arts professor in London, and Illya is the illusive husband that all his students are curious about. That one is growing vaguely close to being finished, so hopefully in a couple weeks I can start publishing. There are oneshots in the works (one which is actually finished and might go up in a few days if I have any confidence in it when I reread) and ideas for longer stories floating around in my head. I've had so much fun with this series that I might continue it, though I don't know how yet. If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to know! Either drop a comment here, or jump over to my tumblr, [here](https://theheirofashandfire.tumblr.com/).
> 
> I love you all, you've been brilliant. Hope to see you all soon.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Degas Affair](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12870822) by [Farisya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Farisya/pseuds/Farisya)




End file.
